Happy Mother's Day

This has been a perfect Mother's Day. I was woken up with breakfast made by my boys and then they agreed to follow my direction and we rearranged the entire house! I love it!
The Living Room
First, the big old couch with the rip in it (the hide-a-bed couch) moved back into the living room, only this time it is up against the windows because the piano is along the main wall. The love seat is over in front of the bookcase near the dining room - not ideal, but it fits. The new rug I bought for the breakfast nook now lives in the living room because for summer we needed to expose the airconditioning vent in the breakfast nook, and the rug covers it.I know the red blanket on the covered couch is not ideal, but we really like the Penny Road Panda blanket with our name on it. Suddenly, there are a lot of pictures over the love seat. Someday, I'll get that clock working again. I love that clock ... mom and dad gave it to us as a wedding present.

What a pretty Chase in the picture. He was following me around.The Family Room

Is EMPTY! Oh yea, this is the most exciting part - almost everything is out of the family room and we went shopping today for a new sectional sofa to put in here! I can't wait, but it will be several weeks. We've narrowed the choices down to two ... on a nice brown leather and one a toasty colored cordoroy. Cordoroy fabric seems to be very popular on couches these days - and it's very soft and cozy. But, it does look like something my friends back home would have had in their basements in the '80's. So, we've got some more discussing to do.

The Play Room

Most of the family room furniture moved into the playroom. This is good, because now the curtains are back with the matching furniture. We had separated them three years ago when we built the addition. The boys don't need so much open space to play anymore, so now they have a couch, a double chair, a table and a coffee table in the playroom. There's still room for Wii, and dance parties, and grandma's table can be popped up for puzzles any time. They each space for their laptops, and the family computer has moved upstairs, since they really don't use it anymore.

The Breakfast Nook

Is unchanged, but was pretty with the sun shining in. We are managing to keep Ben's plant alive. Oh, and the plants outside in the backyard are doing very nicely too.

This is the flower Alek got me, along with the mug he decorated himself.

This is the new salad plate from the boys. It came with beautiful beaded salad tongs that were made by my neighbors Mary and Rita. I didn't get a picture of them, but I love them!

The salad plate is sitting on the buffet, ready for use.

Upstairs Nook

Several years ago we floored our two-story foyer, creating a nook in the hallway upstairs. This has been the most useful space. For many years it was a play area for Little People, Thomas Trains, remote control cars, slot car racing, etc. Most recently it has been a dog hang-out. Now, it's a peaceful reading area with the striped chair and ottoman from the family room next to the computer on the computer table. This is where I'm working right now, because this computer is the one I use to download and store all my pictures. Perfect for reading.

Well, I hear Gary and Alek coming home. Oh, they put up my hammock first thing today, but I haven't had a chance to sit in it yet. We put it up and take it down each time we use it so it doesn't get dirty. There's a nice place to store it right in the backyard shed.

We're heading out for dinner tonight and I'm supposed to decide ... I hate deciding. But, I am getting hungry.

Happy Mother's Day everyone!

US National Whitewater Center

So, we did take some pictures at Ben's last comp ... just found them on my camera today!

This first picture was taken as we arrived - you can see the high climbing tower in the background, and some of the whitewater routes behind it. This is a lovely place, and we had a lot of fun that day before it rained. We will definately go back and raft and climb again. Gary and the boys ....

Part of the climbing team ... in back is Paxton, second row is Amanda, don't know the next girl, then Ben and Cameron. In front are another girl whose name I don't know, Megan the coach, and on the right is Cayley.

Ben's first climb was good ... before the rain started!

Baseball Game

Alek's team had another win last night! I think they've won three and lost two, but I haven't been able to attend all the games. More great pictures from the game!

High fives after the game ... love the teams' colors! We're so happy not to have black, grey or tan t-shirts this year! Celebrating after the win!

Alek warming up with a big stretch ...

Gary, front and center on the bleachers watching the game ...

Alek has pitched the last couple games and I'm so excited to have a picture of it! He got three strike outs! He's got a strong arm, and he's working on his accuracy.

Alek getting some last minute tips from Dad...

Warming up before the game! Love the backwards hat!

Baseball baseball baseball

So I didn't have time to post much about last weekend, but we had a lot of fun at the US National Whitewater Center and the boys did so well rafting that our guide took us down the class 4/5 rapids. It was great, but really wore Ben out for climbing that night. And with the rain (the comp was outdoors) he didn't last long. Didn't matter, he had already qualified for regionals so we had a nice day and evening and breakfast with the team the next morning.
This week was really busy for me, as I went to NY on Weds for an IBM meeting. It was a great day, and I got to see a lot of people I hadn't seen in a long time, and met some of the people I've been workng with for the last 3 years who I'd never met. But, makes for a long week.

Thursday night Alek had a baseball game, Friday was a practice, and today (Saturday) was another game. One of the dad's on our team is a photographer, so we get some really great shots of Alek playing ball ... enjoy!

Planting flowers today

We had a busy outdoor day today. Most springs get past me and I don't put out any flowers. I think it's been 4 years since I even planted a few begonias. But this year Ben promised to help and today was GORGEOUS - about 70 degrees and sunny. Alek and Gary had gone to a Cub Scout camping trip Saturday night, so Ben and I got up and got working on some chores.

Ben scrubbed all the patio furniture and I painted it with rustoleum. I never thought 16 years ago that our patio set from Endicott would still be with us, but every couple years I paint the rust and away it goes for another year.

We went to the garden center and had a great time picking out flowers! Good think Gary's easy-going, because we spent a small fortune. I was afraid we got too many, but our garden is pretty big, and we ended up with some very nice,colorful, symmetrical arrangements.

The area under the bird feeders, before (he look, Gary's sitting in one of my newly painted chairs!)
Back garden before flowers ...

More back garden before any flowers ...

Nice view of some of the flowers we planted today - Ben dug most of the holes! Gary and Alek took two trips to the Home Depot and brought back all the mulch - we spread 20 bags (although the mulch is now package in 2 cu ft bags ... used to come in 3 cu ft bags!)

In the back you see two plants with long purple spikes - these are very striking! In the middle is a yellow daisy-like bush, and in the front are varigated bright pink wave petunias, and a yellow wave petunia.

The pink flowers under the hanging basket are Pentas.

Lantana on the left, purple spike plant on the right, and 'million bells' in the front.

The yellow flowers in front are called 'million bell's, and the Lantana on the right is the color 'Ann Maria' which it pink on the outside and yellow on the inside. On the far right is the 'shimp plant' which had tall yellow flowers, and on the left is a new plant that will have long purple spikes all summer long.

So Ben and I were talking today and he asked why we didn't have any plants inside the house. I told him that I used to have lots of plants in the house, then we had babies and I had to give all my plants away. So we agreed to find a couple houseplants at the garden store today when we shopped for our flowers. Well, true to form, Ben fell in love with the ugliest plant I have ever seen and now it lives on my kitchen table because it's too HUGE to put anywhere else!

Ben really liked the yellow and orange bloom ... oh my.

Haircuts

The boys got their hair cut a couple weeks ago. Ben's hair had never been so long, so we took some picture!
The front of Ben's hair, before being cut. The side of Ben's hair, before being cut.

AFTER! He likes it short, and it looks good on him!

The front of Alek's hair before being cut - he likes it long, which is fine, but sometimes it needs trimmed up. Looking a little bushy here ...

And AFTER ... much cleaner looking, but this was VERY SHORT for him!

The Cruise and Costa Maya Mexico

My favorite part of the ship - our room had a large balcony overlooking the back of the ship. I spent a lot of time out here reading. Ben crashed the first afternoon on the ship. He slept for three hours on the couch. The first night, we were all up after midnight doing fun stuff on the ship. After that first day, we all got into the late night/late morning groove.

In the hallway of the ship, ready to depart for Costa Maya.

Getting off the boat. Ours was the Grandeur of the Seas, one of Royal Carribean's smallest ships. On the right is the Independence of the Seas, two classes larger than ours. They were on a 6 day cruise, they went everywhere we went, but had stopped in Belize first.

Getting into the town of Costa Maya. The few building there are all painte bright colors. We got into a bus and drive for about 20 minutes to the Jungle Beach Club where the beach was awesome. We did a little shopping.

The Carlsons all together in Costa Maya. What a peaceful day.

The boys loaded up for sea kayaking.

Alek in the crystal clear waters in Costa Maya. The dark part of the water was coral that you could snorkel over.

Gary was pretty happy at the Jungle Beach Club in Costa Maya. It was hot that day, but the breeze was cool. Oh, and the drinks were FREE!

Ben and Alek on the beach at the Jungle Beach Club in Costa Maya. What a lovely place --- look at the clear blue sky and that aqua water. Absolutely breathtaking.