Sleeping

Even More Birthday Pictures!

More Birthday Pictures!

Melissa's Birthday!

We spent Melissa's birthday weekend up at the lake! We had a nice time! Melissa's friend Jenny L. (formerly Jenny Q.) came up with her Mini Schnauzer named Baxter. Baxter is one, Hailey is three. They hit it off but both are fixed!


Melissa's Grandpa and Marge came up as well as her Aunt and Uncle Brian and Laurie and her cousins Matt and Andy.

Melissa's mom got Melissa a cupcake birthday cake.


The night before, I asked Melissa's sister Laura to go to the store to get Melissa some nice ice cream for her birthday. I was busy destroying Laura's husband Scott in Wii MarioKart during this time. Melissa was sleeping. Laura made the late night run to Walmart and brought back MooseTrack's Ice Cream! It was a hit! The boys liked the ice cream. Melissa liked it so much that she asked me to bring it in to our family picture!


In addition to the ice cream, Laura also got balloons and streamers. Melissa's cousin Breanna and Greg's girlfriend Rebecca helped put up the decorations.

Laura, Scott and me and Hayden went to Home Despot (purposefully misspelled) today to get wood, paint and other stuff to make a bean bag toss game. It is still in the works, but I will post the final product once it is finished. Melissa spent the day waterskiing. A good weekend.

Twitter, Jardine Cribs and Pink Buckets

Melissa is Twittering. Not me.

Our cribs suck! Jardine, the crib maker, posted a recall of our cribs. Now we have to disassemble them, send back specific parts, order new cribs (different design since they don't make these anymore), put those cribs together, dance a jig, get a rebate check from Jardine for the old cribs, get reimbursed from Babies R Us pay the difference for the new cribs, bang our heads against the wall, hope the new cribs don't get recalled, and not be pissed off. The old cribs were cool. Not too expensive, and we bought a matching changing table/dresser. We had hoped to find cherry cribs similar to ours but to no avail. The new cribs will not exactly match the changing table, and the new cribs are more expensive, but more robust. We plan to have a crib assembling party with two cases of beer, chips and a potato gun.

This guy may like his new crib. Funny thing, we use to give them baths in these buckets when they were in the NICU and when they got home. Funny how big they have gotten.

What's New?

well, what is new? Donovan is walking around pretty regularly. Hayden is still choosing to crawl even though he could probably walk more than he does. We plan to start teaching them baby sign language. Their vocabularly is pretty limited to momma-ma, dadda-da, dis, dat, and Brett Favre. Everything else is pretty much the norm. Melissa and I realized that we have to catch up on about 5 episodes of Lost, the Office and other shows that we DVR. We will eventually get to watching all of them, but not this weekend.

Melissa will not be getting a new tv, a new minivan or bling for her birthday. Instead, she will be getting a slight home remodel to the kitchen, downstairs bathroom and family room. We will make some subtle changes which will make the house a better home and should help elevate the price of the house should we ever need to sell. We are not planning on selling, but if someone gave us a great offer . . . .

We also did not win the free stroller. Dang. Oh well.

Randomness

Chunkadillo at dinner at the Milwaukee Ale House!



Tubby at the pool!


Tubby getting ready for bed!

Shopping

We started like this...
and ended like this...

Can anyone guess the first boy I had to remove from the car?

Melissa

Sunscreen Makes Me Crazy!!!

Congratulations Bill and Erica!!!

Independence Day!

Donovan and Hayden celebrated Independence Day by being completely uncooperative in picture taking (as you can see below)! They celebrated today and went swimming, played a lot, refused to take a morning nap, hung out with Craig W., ate tacos, and did a lot of other fun stuff! Special thanks to Craig for visiting us for a few days. It is always nice to see him!

Melissa and I looked back today at pictures and videos from last year in the Fourth of July! Last year the boys were carried around in slings and slept, cried, ate repeat. It is difficult to even remember those days after the boys were born, but it was good to look back, see that we had a good time, and can see how well the boys are doing. Some peace of mind is an essential part of independence.

Day in the Dells

We went to Wisconsin Dells today to go to a waterpark and to just see the sites. It was tough to go to the Dells without taking a moment to see the devastation left by the draining of Lake Delton. We had seen the news, the video, and pictures of what happened to Lake Delton, but seeing it in person gave a whole new appreciation for the power of nature and the unfortunate circumstances faced by those with property, homes, and businesses on that Lake. We drove all around Lake Delton where we could get visible views including going near the area where Highway A collapsed and caused the drain of water out of Lake Delton and into the Wisconsin River. It was like visiting a wake. The lake was empty except for tree stumps and absolutely stupid tourists, and their children, walking around in the remaining puddles of water--where sewage was dumped--when the lake drained. It is scary to think this was such a freak occurrence--one that could happen to us. Lake Delton is a good sized lake--about 270 acres. To put it into perspective, consider if the lake that we camp on was washed away (Lake Sherwood, 250 acres).

After paying homage to Lake Delton, we went to Riverview Park and Waterworld. Tickets were only ten bucks each so it was cheap. Since the boys are barely walking, and since they sink like rocks (not very good bouys), we figured there was no sense in going to Noah's Ark or Family Land. We had a good time in the children's areas. The Wave Pool was shut down in memorial of Lake Delton. Melissa and I went down a few waterslides. The slides were pathetic, but we still had a good time.

We went to dinner on the way back to the camper on Castle Rock Lake at Carlson's. Carlson's is a decent Wisconsin-style restaurant with a great salad bar. Just be aware of the deceptive spelling in the menu. Only in Wisconsin will you find a fine-dining restaurant with the audacity to serve Lobster, Alaskan King Crab Legs, prime cuts of meat, and, in certain dishes, "Krab." Now what is "Krab"? Go to Carlson's, read the menu, order a dish with Krab and find out (hint, it is imitation crab meat). For example, Carlsons will include large shrimp, good-sized scallops, cod and Krab in their seafood sampler (bad news, it is mostly Krab--about 75% Krab to go with my 3 shrimp, 3 scallops, and 3 small snippets of cod). It is not to say that Carlson's did not warn you, since the menu says the seafood sampler includes Krab. Additionally, Carlson's house speciality, the Seafood Newburg, is also loaded with Krab. More like "Krap." Either way, if you are going to eat at Karlson's (not Carlson's anymore), then consider ordering something without the Krab. Also, the cheesey baked potato is just a baked potato with hot cheese sauce dumped on top--truly the product of culinary vision. The view at Karlson's though, is very nice, and a good stroll on the beach is always nice after dinner. We will probably go back--but no Krab.