Happily Ever After (and our adventures along the way): Miles V's birthday and other fun times

Well, as usual it's been too long since we've blogged. But such is life with two active boys! I wanted to share a few things that we have been up to in the last few weeks.

Miles V turned 3!!!

Yes, it is true our sweet, loving, smart first born is now a big three year old! As the days pass and he grows more and more, I am constantly amazed at how very blessed we are. He is an angel. I'm sure every parent feels this way about their kids... but I never understood it until recently. A few facts about Miles--- he knows all of his letters by sight and all of the sounds they makes. He can count to 20... He loves loves loves to read books and he can 'read' you a book after you've read it to him just once or twice. He is very good at riding his tricycle and loves to do this whenever he can. He loves playing games, and consistenly beats mom at Cootie and Hi-Ho-Cheery-o. He currently knows four Bible verses by heart (and has even taught some of them to mom!). One of his favorite things to do is go swimming on Friday nights. He LOVES when his daddy comes home! He loves playing with his little brother, and is very excited to meet his new little baby! There are so many more things to say about him but he will probably be up from his nap soon so I better move on :)

For his birthday we bought him a fishtank. He and Max have an abundance of toys and we thought that a fish tank would be fun, and also teach him responsibility. Well, through no fault of his own Larry, Goofy, and Nemo have all gone to fishy heaven in just two weeks. But now we have another batch of fish to love--welcome home Daisy, Goofy (2) and Mickey. We hope you fair better than your previous tank mates.

We also took him to Chuck-E-Cheese for his birthday. He and Max had a blast with their cousins... but perhaps Papa and Daddy had the most fun? That's a hard call! After Chuck-E-Cheese we headed to Great-Grandma Jean's for cake and ice cream. Miles V and Uncle Greg were both celebrating their birthdays... and you can see from the pictures the determination that Miles had in blowing out his candles. Please disregard the spit on the cake... :)

Good morning, Birthday Boy!

Notice the concentration:

My buddy and I:

Happy Birthday, sweet Miles. You make daddy and I soooo proud... we stay up at night and talk about the amazing things you and your brother do each day. We love you so much!

Playgroup
I've been taking the boys to storytime for about a year and a half, and they love it, and I love it! I've met some sweet moms there---Amber,her son Samson, and baby Mae and Melissa, her daughter Felina and baby #2 due in April. We've recently we've started getting the kids together on Thursday mornings to let them play and run off some energy. Miles LOVES it, and he even got to hold 8 week old baby Mae last week, which he talked about for the rest of the day. Looks like hes ready for his baby, don't you think?!

Anyway, I had to share one of my proudest 'mommy' moments. Last week the kids wanted to take a lap around the acre-wide park, and so we walked. And walked. This is a little tedious b/c Max is slow, but the kids love it. When we got back to the park, a sea of kids from the nearby daycare was playing. Our kiddos ran off to play some more and it was almost hard to spot them there were so many others playing. Amber and I were chatting, and I had one eye on Miles across the park at the slides with Samson, and one on Max who was just walking around. You know kids love other little kids, and so all of a sudden Max was surrounded by older kids talking to him, and holding hands. Next time I looked over there, Miles had booked it across the entire park and had Max in a bear hug and was talking to the kids. Then he released Max and went back to play with Samson. A few minutes later we had to make a trip to the potty, so I asked him what he was doing with Max. He said: "I was protecting him, mama. I told them my name was Miles and his name was Max and he was my little brother." OMG, I about lost it. I will NEVER forget that moment, and I'm so thankful once again for that sweet angel's heart!

Zoo Time:

Some weekends we go to church on Saturday night and sometimes we go on Sunday morning. This weekend we went Saturday night, so we decided to get some more use out of our Biopark pass and take the kids to the zoo Sunday morning. We had the place to ourselves, but unfortunately it was a little cold. Apparently big monkeys don't come out until it is at least 40 degrees. But it was a fun trip for the four of us, and the kids LOVE it (Miles and I do too!). Here are a few pics from that trip

Peacocks: