WATCH: Big bro helps with pajamas

WATCH: Lullaby in sleepy masks

The sleepy masks were my idea to help keep their wandering eyes closed and keep them focused on falling asleep. Sometimes the masks work great and the boys are asleep in seconds.. other times, they don't work but at least the boys look sweet and silly wearing them.

Boys being boys

It goes without saying that our little chipmunks are having fun with their Grampa! As you can see here boys are teaching Grampa all about Switch n Go Dinos...or maybe it's the other way around?

My heart is full

I just read them books, snuggled with them on the floor, sang them songs, rubbed their eyes and faces, and listened to them fall asleep. I feel so so lucky to their mommy.

3 Man Crew

Big momma decided to buy the boys a new rocking chair for no special occasion really....just thought a bigger one would be nicer so we can all sit together to read books. Our old rocker sat just one adult with one kid in lap. This new one will fit one adult tushie with a boy sitting on each side. The boys are excited, especially David Tre because he was usually the one who had to sit on the floor and he felt left out. Our new rocker has arrived and the boys are boisterously helping Daddy assemble it. By helping I mean playing with the screws and washers and running around to different rooms laughing.

Scrubbly bubbly babes

By far far far the best part of my day. (Pic taken in the middle of the week after a long day of work)

Riding the daddy horse

It's a fun Sunday morning in our pajamas. ..footsie pjs for boys, of course. It's freezing cold outside so the boys are snuggly warm and being silly together inside the house. Big D is putting together a new lego toy.

My three dates

Could a girl get any luckier, I ask you?? My three handsome guys are taking me to the movie theater to see the new Charlie Brown movie. I tried for a chick flick but was voted down...hmmm.

Oh my gourd

David Tre and hubby had so much fun carving this pumpkin last night. It's kinda hard to see the design in this picture...the carving is a bat hanging upside down. Monkey here slept all night with this giant pumpkin on his nightstand right beside his bed. This morning he pushed and pulled it from his room, down the hallway, into our bedroom and woke us up by talking about how much he loves his bat-carved pumpkin and also about how much he wants pancakes for breakfast.

Left work early for this

I'm back at work this week and I've missed my boys. I secretly cried three out of the four days because I was away from them for too long....I didn't get home until after 5pm each day and last saw Oakley the nights before. But today...oh beeautiful day...I got off work at 1:30pm and went straight home to soak up these two sweet humans every extra second I could. I promised them a trip to a playground and so here we are. I couldn't be happier spending this time with them...precious precious time.

Nini's first Blue Jackets game, plus a major 1st!

Our family does everything together, and one thing we do, truthfully, a lot, with our kids is take them to Blue Jackets games.   We are not season ticket holders by any means, but tickets are quite affordable (mainly because they haven't been the best team the last few years) and the boys really seem to enjoy going to the games.   Davey has been going to games since we moved to Columbus, and Oakley started going probably when he was maybe 6 months old or so.   We joke that Oakley has an "entourage" at bedtime because of all the friends he wants to sleep with.   Blanket is always there, but he now has a Blue Jackets Mickey Mouse, aka, Hockey Mick Mouse, also there is "sting sting" who is Stinger, the mascot for the Blue Jackets.   Anyways, so when Nini was in town, the timing was perfect to take her to dinner at one of our favorite pre-hockey restaurants and then walk over to Nationwide to catch a pre-season game.  

 

This season is special too, because we now have to buy Oakley his own seat to every game :(  but he is damn cute, and he loves watching the games, and all the stuff that goes on during the game.   If his attention ever strays... we just tell him we saw sting sting and ask him where he is at.   Well, Nini got to see a hell of a game (last time the jackets won...grrr) but 7 goals, meaning 7 cannon blasts, some fights, the blimp, and of course sting sting. 

Normally, I don't want to miss half a period dragging Crystal around the arena looking for Stinger, but since her mom was there and they were having a good time cheering for more fights to happen, and singing the hockey song, I figured I would take the boys quickly to stinger.   Well, we missed him, and had to wait until after the intermission.   Luckily, Mike Todd, the in-arena emcee saw me watching my kids play in stingers house kid thing at the arena and was nice enough to say hello.   So after I wrangled the kids, I found him and explained we have been trying for probably a dozen plus games to meet Stinger, and he gave me a hot tip when we can find the green bee!

 

Oakley almost shit his pants when he saw stinger up close, then as we got closer, got really scared.   His idol is like 7' tall!   Davey gave Stinger a hug, Oaks gave him a fist bump, but wouldn't stand next to him for a picture (that's why I am in here).   I wasn't going to miss a chance for Oakley and Davey to meet stinger and get a pic with him.

 

Overall, we all had a great time as always.   I love doing stuff with my family, and I was happy that we were able to share this with Nini too!   Hockey is a strange sport to watch if you have never really watched it before.   Between the rules, the line shifts, and the fighting it can be a lot.   But truthfully, its probably one of the most enjoyable sports to watch in person too, because its non-stop action.  I still remember my first Hockey game I ever went to with my dad (Blackhawks game).   My cousin was supposed to meet us with tickets, but he told us the wrong place, and my dad ended up buying great seats for us at the old Chicago stadium in the corner behind the blackhawks goal.   The seats were low, close, and it was amazing.   I hope our boys always remember and love all the times we took them to games too!   Davey has already said he will not be playing hockey (he doesn't like falling on the ice), but Oakley.... well lets just say we know a really good dentist already :)

Davey Dresses Oakley For Bed.... Eventually

So Davey has figured out how to dress his brother for bed.   If you want to just see that part, skip to the 2:00 mark.   But if you want to enjoy the hilarity of Davey trying to dress Oaks, watch the whole thing.   These are our boys, and this is how it is every day with these two :)

Walks to School

So part of the reason we picked where we live is because of the schools.   We are very close to Davey's school.  Its about 0.8 miles walking to our house.  So typically I drive Davey to school then go to work right after.   Well, lately the weather has been perfect, and Davey has wanted to walk to school.   I love it too!   So what I do, I grab my work stuff, load it in the car, drive to his school and park across the street, then walk back home and get ready.   Well, it takes me about 12 mins to walk home.   Davey to walk to school used to be a solid 30 mins, but he is getting much faster.   What I love about our walks, is he always asks me questions, a lot of them are tough, and typically science stuff.   Well he confirmed this the other day when he said he "loves when we walk to school and I ask you tough science questions"   We have talked about gravity, forces, photosynthesis, garbage trucks, orbits of the sun, earth, and moon, recycling and much more.   Its actually freakin awesome the amazing stuff his little brain comes up with.   My favorite has still been during the gravity conversation.  After I explained to him gravity he asked about why a ball thrown up in the air doesn't fall right away, so I had to explain about the force your hand exerts on the ball.   Now remember, he just turned 5, so explaining this can be tough sometimes.   I thought he was lost, then he says "so daddy, rocket blasters on a spaceship have more force than gravity and that's why they can send astronauts into outer space right?"  Learning Newtons 3rd law about equal and opposite reactions at 5 years old???  Yup, that's Davey :) 

 

This pic was snapped the other day, when he wanted to take his scooter to school.   It was a mild 45 this morning :)  I love this kid.

 

General Brofer-ness (Early October 2015)

 

If you know anything about me, you know how much I love our children.   I also love how well they treat each other, which is a direct result of my amazing wife.   She always wanted our kids to be best friends, and so far 2.2+ years in, they are :)   Below are a bunch of general brothers pictures of these two wonderful kids.   First these pictures were from the Home Depot Kids Workshop the first Saturday of the month.  October is fire prevention/awareness month, so it was time to make a fire truck.   Davey helped Oaks with his truck, even held the nail while Oakley hammered (I quickly caught the hammer before Oaks destroyed Daveys fingers).

 

When it came time to paint, Davey went traditional, red.   Oakley, started with red, then wanted to a more stealthy red/black truck with a racing stripe on it.  This kind of is an example of our childrens personalities.   Davey is more careful and conservative, Oakley, is less cautious and wild.

Oaks earned his 2nd pin, while Davey pulled his 13th I think.   And yes, Davey is wearing an Ohio State jersey.   I would have rather it been a Purdue jersey, but lets face it, they suck, and Ohio state is great, and Davey has lived here more than half his life now.  Plus when you say "O-H" Davey knows to respond "I-O!"  So I think he has earned it :)

It was raining that day, if you couldn't tell from the boots.  Also, when Daddy is playing zone defense in a store, I require the boys hold hands.   It hasn't failed me yet.   I love these kids.

Crystal shared some pics in an earlier blog from the chopper, but I had different pics, and they are cute so I added them here.   In the pic, the Pilot, Spencer is showing Davey and Oakley what all the controls do, and as you can tell he has kids, cause he was great with the kids too.

I love this picture, because the helicopter is off, but the headphones cancel a ton of sound, so Spencer put the sound on so they could hear each other through the headphones when they talked. 

Pilot and Co-pilot :)

When I bathe the boys, we constantly do silly shit, and I try to take pics sometimes and send them to mommy to make her smile.   I think this one was a winner.

The boys needed a nap bad one afternoon, so I said we could bring Davey's bed into Oaks room.   Great idea dad.  3 hours later no one napped.  But it made for some great conversations and lots of laughs.

 

Davey is now in turtle swim class... after his first class, we took the boys out for Ice Cream.  Oakley caught the Cavs pre-season game on tv in a bar and started watching... this kid loves basketball

 

 

Brofters sharing ice cream :)

Oh Oaks!

And..... Davey :)

Finally, our boys were invited to attend our friends' wedding.   Aside from the fact Oakley wouldn't look at the camera, and Davey wouldn't smile like a normal child, our kids were really well behaved.   I was very touched that our friends thought our kids were well behaved enough to attend a late afternoon/evening wedding.   If Sara and Andres get an extra bill for all the cheese and cracker that were eaten, our kids can accept responsibility for that ;)

Davey Passes Tadpole! (Swimming)

Crystal has Davey in swim lessons in Westerville, and he loves it!   He has been swimming his way up the ranks, and this has been the most challenging class for him so far.   Its Tadpole.  They have to be comfortable going under water.   Floating on their backs, and fronts, and even doing some swimming without help.   Davey did amazing, and he tried so hard.  We have been practicing a lot too, and it paid off!  Below is the pics of the last day of Tadpole class, when the kids got to have some fun...

 

 

Davey was quite happy that he passed the class too!

 

 

Oakley wanted to watch the players playing Basketball... of course :)

 



Noni & Papa visit v 2.0

Noni & Papa visited again, which was great.   It was a quick visit so I didn't take a ton of photos, but I wanted to add to what Crystal posted earlier.   So Noni and Papa got off the plane and I saw them through security, well Mom was taking longer than normal in the bathroom... I was hoping she was feeling ok... Oh yea she was, she bought this costume, knowing that Davey LOVES superheros.   Yes, this grown woman wore this through the airport, and yes, everyone on her flight was looking at her in the baggage area.   I think they could tell how happy she had made her grandsons.   I asked her to wear it the rest of the day, she didn't :(

 

 

We took Noni & Papa to Delaware (the town, not the state, btw Dad, Dover is still the capital, and that's 2 points in scategories).  After lunch we walked around Delaware, where Noni and Crystal shopped a bit, and Oakley took a massive stinky poop in his diaper.

Noni and Papa came in on Tuesday, so they got to see Davey at swim lessons in Westerville.   Oakley made sure to hold Noni's hand so she wouldn't slip.

 

Oaks looks deep in conversation with Noni about bobs and other swimming moves by Day-day

 

the next day we were in uptown Westerville when Noni bought Oakley, Papa, and her favorite son a cookie.   It was one of those smiley face cookies, and Oaks took his time enjoying it streetside.   Soooo Cute!

Pool, Corn Maze, and More!

 

So just like the last time, we stayed in the same hotel north of Indy after the Purdue game.   We went to the pool for a couple of hours after we arrived.   Then the next morning, we did breakfast, and of course our boys now love waffles so they had a meal full of fruit and waffles and syrup.  Then it was time to hit the pool until they kicked us out at checkout.

 

Now, this time, we were pretty much planning on going home, but we were in the middle of Indiana, so we stopped at farm.  No, really we did, but it was a farm with a giant corn maze.  Piney Acres farm was quite impressive, two corn mazes and lots of stuff to do for the kids.

Below is a "selfie" type view when I raised my long monkey arm above my head with my phone... this is what you could see around this tall ass corn.... more corn

 

Well, as you can see, our sweet, soft little boy got scared when he thought we were lost... in the kiddie maze.   Yes, the kiddie maze :)

 

So I wanted to take a picture of my family in the corn maze.   Davey and Crystal smiled for the photo.... and Oakley, caught trying to eat corn :)

A lady took this picture before we entered the "adult" maze.  It should have taken 30 mins to complete, we were in there for way longer, and only because of my ninja cat reflexes was I able to back track us out of this maze.   Oaks would have finished with me, but Crystal and Davey were done

 

The great thing about children and mazes, you can send them down a row to see if its a dead end, like a parrot in a tunnel.

 

I love this picture of the 4 of us, we had our made hunt things punched a bit, and the boys were tired of walking so we carried them a bit :)

 

They had a huge pumpkin field there too.   Davey grabbed that pumpkin and talked about how heavy it was.

Oakley then grabbed an equally large pumpkin and acted like it was no big deal, except when I tried to snap a pic of him, then he looked like he was saying "oh its on"

Finally, before we left, Davey wanted to shoot this modified crossbow thing.  it shot little nerf Velcro darts.   Davey had great form and good aim :)

2nd Trip To Purdue

Since the first trip to Purdue went so well, we decided to do it again, and this time on an even more perfect weather day.  We had done it once already, so this time we were more efficient.  
We arrived around 830 in the morning like last time, and had the grill fired up early.   I love these three in the picture below.   You can tell from the long shadows it was early

The hot dogs were ready first & of course Oakley wanted to eat first.   Nothing like a breakfast hot dog, and of course, he starts in the middle... strange :)

 

The boys chowed down, and then it was time for mommy and daddy to enjoy a cold beverage and a snack and watch our boys play bags.

 

We got seats in the family section on the ends so there would be more space.   It was fight back against cancer day, so Davey is playing with his pink ribbon, Oakley... watching the teams warm-up before the game starts... and mommy was just enjoying the view, wishing they served wine inside the stadium :)

 

It actually was a good game back and forth.   Davey cannot go to a Purdue game without his train whistle.   Funny thing about that thing, it was actually Daddy's from 16 years ago :) 

 

After Purdue lost the game with less than 10 seconds to go, it was time to go back to the car and have some more fun and tailgate for a couple more hours.  The boys wanted to play some more of their bags game, so I played against Davey and Oaks was the official bag keeper/handler.

 

Crystal took lots of pictures of the action (of course)

 

Below Day-day took his turn

 

Now it was daddy's turn

 

And finally it was Oakley's turn to show us how to really play.   Look how happy brother was ;)

 

Even though Purdue lost, it was a really fun day again.  We tailgated a lot, a real lot, probably 5.5-6 hours.   What I love now, is when Oakley hear's "Purdue" he says "go to football game"  so I know the memories are reaching through his brown hair into his cute little head.