Another Fun Wednesday

It was gorgeous on Wednesday morning, so we decided to head to the trail.  Griffin's bike was in need of repair (Fortunately we discovered that Santa had a deal with Wal-Mart....if you get a bike from Santa for Christmas and something goes wrong with it, Wal-Mart will fix it.  :) ), so he rode the John Deere bike that his buddy Hunter fixed up for him.  We had fun exploring along the way.  

 When we got home we spotted some really dark, strange clouds!

 We worked on some party preparations (these are the "pin the dog tag on Scooby Doo" tags we made).

 Then the boys decided to take cover under the table since it was raining really hard.

 Preston thought this was pretty funny!  He makes this face when he is giggly.

 The dog tags are done!

Fortunately, the storm passed quickly so we could head to swim lessons.  Griffin has been doing an awesome job swimming on his own!!

Our Little Helper

Griffin loves to help....I think it's so cute when he drags the giant trash can up the looooooong driveway!

Basement Basketball

Jamie has been wanting to put a basketball hoop in our basement for a while now, on President's Day the boys worked together to make it happen!

Griffin decided to take a few photos, this is my favorite....

Griffin told Jamie he didn't think that I know how to shoot baskets or dribble the ball, so I showed him my skills!

It's not all about us.

We had a great "it's not all about us Wednesday"!  We rang the bell for the Salvation Army for an hour--it was interesting to say the least.  :)  Wendy joined us, and we both had a huge chuckle when Griffin shook the bell ferociously, a lady walked by and didn't give us any money, then turned around and said, "Well, that didn't work!"  It was hard for him to sit still, but he was quite entertaining, and it was good to know that he was learning that life isn't all about us, and Christmas isn't all about presents.  We're blessed and giving back to others is important.

In the afternoon, we went to a local nursing home to decorate cookies with 13 residents.  We couldn't take any photos of the residents for privacy reasons, but here are some photos of our time there.

 Here are the cookies one resident made! 

It was so great....the residents had a wonderful time and loved spending time with the kids.  It made my heart happy.

Our Little Helper

Griffin's responsibility chart has spurred on lots of helping around the house...it's awesome!!  Check him out!

 He put away all of the recycling bins all by himself!

 He loves helping with laundry.

 He even gets the clean clothes out of the washer....

 and into the dryer!

 He loved scrubbing the toilets.  YES!!!!

 Look at him clean the van!

 A reward for a great day of hard work on Wednesday (Mommy day). 

I wonder if this will last into his teenage years??

Apples

My parent had a nice big apple harvest, so they loaded us up with apples.  I showed Griffin how to use the applepeelercorerslicer and he love it--he figured it out in one try!

Responsibilities

One of the things that was asked during our home study is what Griffin's responsibilities are.  He gets himself dressed, brushes his teeth (once a day, we do it the other time---just in case he misses a spot!), takes out the compost and cleans up toys (not always as our living room floor can prove).  So, when I found this cool responsibilities chart, I knew it would be a good addition to his room.  We've used it for a week now, and it's been great.  He wants to help with things so he can put a magnet on the board, and now he's on top of things that we ask him to do!  I love Melissa & Doug!

Homemade treats

Griffin saw an ice cube tray the other and he asked us if we knew that you could pour juice in them and freeze it--and make popcicles!  After pouring the juice, we started to cover it with foil so that the sticks would stay straight, but he told us we could just lay the sticks to the side.  And, sure enough, he was right!

Griffin Doing Chores

We decided to add some new chores to Griffin's list of things to help with around the house.  He's the new compost-carrier-outer.  He does a fabulous job.  Well, except for the time that he accidentally threw the entire compost container in the bin.  And, then that other time that he was afraid he'd get run over by the lawn mower, so he dumped the compost bucket our near the compost container, but not IN it.  Fortunately, it was just watermelon rinds that time.  We watch the little guy accomplish this task and literally have tears running down our faces.  He cracks me up. 

Chores

Making Laundry Detergent

Here's my buddy helping me make laundry detergent! Yep, teaching green!

Oops! Locked out!

I locked Griffin and I out the other day....Jamie was in the Cities, and the extra key broke off in the front door. What to do? We had a great day! We played with the Eilers, went to the library, out to lunch, visited co-workers and went mall walking with Kari/Larry. When Jamie got home he cut the door knob off and Griffin was happy to help him fix it. Griffin had to make sure he got his "work gloves" on. Yep, they are winter gloves, but he calls them his work gloves. :)

"Gardening"