C-H-I-C-A-G-O

Most who know me, KNOW I love this city!!! For Mother's Day Larry took us to Chicago for a quick visit. Although a quick viist, we're not short on pictures and this is just a small sampling of our pictures...

Our most favorite hotel...Omni Chicago~ Mom and Robby up on ledge above the bed in our room.

Tommy making a phone call already...

Robby liked this view so much, we made him a bed and he slept up on that shelf/ledge above our bed!

We visited the Sears Tower, I'd never been and Larry had childhood memories of visiting it and wanted to take the family there.
Kids at the top of the Tower...

and Mom and Dad at the Top too...

Kimberlyn left her mark on Top of the Sears Tower...somehow she shoved her PENNY in the view finder of this viewer....ugh, you'd thought it were her favorite stuffed animal we left there!

Tommy wanted to go on the carriage ride, while Daddy got this adorable picture of the girls peaking out the window, Tommy spilled fruit punch on my SHOE and I realized he came with a bad odor...he and his poo-poo butt had to go to the room with Daddy and Robby!
Waving bye-bye... By the way, Robby had a cool new book about making paper airplanes he rather look at than go on a carriage ride. Last time we stayed at the Omni was for Kaitlyn's 8th birthday which she was ill for, Kaitlyn wanted to ride in the horse drawn carriage BUT it was too cold for her to handle it.

One very TALL statue!

Millennium Park!

Mama loves her tulips...
Very interesting mirrored-like jelly bean structure....can make one feel dizzy almost going through all the pictures Larry took here!
The family in the mirror with a reflection of the city!

under the center looking straight up...



Don't even think for a second this was to be of me :) Larry thinks this building is cool! I do think the picture came out very nice!

Another reason for the visit was Garrett's Popcorn~

We learned we weren't the only ones that traveled so far for popcorn! We were told they opened at 10am, we arrived a bit before and decided to WAIT...until a worker walking in told me they didn't open until ELEVEN!! While waiting for at least 10 minutes we saw MANY just walk by after realizing it was closed. We came backa few minutes before 11am to find THIS LINE!!! We pressed on to lunch, and returned later for our popcorn. So upon our third time arriving at Garrett's we got some super YUMMY popcorn!!

Cute shot of Kimberlyn and Daddy!

A frustrated and tired Kaitlyn and Robby....this was BEFORE the rain and HAIL- OH MY, we had fun!

Tommy during a sweet, innocent moment...

Wearing one of my all time favorite outfits from his big brother!! Isn't it hard to believe this adorable boy can cause so much ruckus??

Yes, now you see why I document all this with pictures!

Good night!!

Another TROUBLE T post....

I still owe at least some fun cousin pictures we did with my nephews at Easter time...if I'm going to let EASTER slide....

But more pressing...as I downloaded pictures while at the computer intending to write a couple checks for a couple bills I saw these pictures that I -believe it or NOT- forgot about! I forgot so much, I honestly have no clue where I went or what I was doing....I do recall thinking I was gone about 5 minutes and thinking "how could he do this?"
Trouble T in action May 5, 2009

I KNEW when I left he was playing NICELY with all those large water bottle/cups...I didn't care, I figured if it entertained him great, I'll do (drawing a blank now)- you get the idea!

So, I walk in and find this boy yet with another KNIFE and what looked like dried BLOOD all over himself.

Obviously the cups got boring, so he started WASHING them with stovetop cleaner...that got old too, so he took some Greased Lightening to EVERYTHING. I've yet to figure out what and why the knife is on the floor in front of the fridge??? He obviously unloaded it out of the dishwasher and DID NOT Use it on himself, instead had a BROWN marker that he used to decorate his body! (the green on him is the stove top cleaner) Doesn't the snotty nose just top this off for picture of the year??


I do have to say the snotty nose scared me about his ears, I forget when he went to the pediatrician, but we did get an all clear and I was shocked. More shocking was yesterday the Children's Hospital in St. Louis Tommy had a hearing test, completely perfect hearing, more shocking was that the test to check for fluid, revealed his ears are fluid free. All exciting news! The specialist came in and took a peak in his ears. Completely healed from tubes falling out and perfect looking. So instead of a new set of tubes, for now we'll wait and check back with the ENT in the Fall. Praise God on this good news!
Please keep Tommy in your prayers, I do fear another ear infection in his future, ear infections aren't such a big deal for some, BUT for Tommy his ear infections have not cleared with one round of antibiotics. In fact his first infection never fully cleared until after getting antibiotic shots and tubes placed in his ears. This last infection he got in March took three rounds of antibiotics to clear it. I'm not content with him being on this much medication for an ear infection, I find it quite bothersome.

St. Louis Zoo....

Oh, my did we have gorgeous weather and a wonderful time! We went just before Easter with my brothers who were out visiting. This may be picture overload, BUT seeing Larry took over 100 pictures that day, consider it just a few!

Kaitlyn, Robby and Tommy looking....

Lil' Robby (my nephew) looking...

Tommy and Kimberlyn still looking...

Mommy and Tommy looking....

Looking at WHAT....THIS GUY catching lunch...we caught feeding time t the seal and walrus pond. Boy it was mesmerizing...

Kaitlyn pulling, Robby and Brice (can't see much of Brice) pushing and Lil' Robby and Tommy enjoying the ride...

Looking at some reptile of some sort....can't you tell by my face. The reflection looked too cool not to post my "uck" face!

My brother Bill and his son Patrick looking at something...

A girl and her tulips...I LOVE tulips and made everyone stop for a quick photo shoot :) Mama and her girls...

A Peacock with no FEAR!!
The kids just hanging out seeing how close the Peacock will come...
Tommy wanting to get closer...

Uncle Robb on "pulling" duty! With his son Robby and Kimberlyn enjoying the ride!

Tommy with his new pal, Brice...sweet cousins!

Fun on the carousel...

How about some crazy goats!
Kimberlyn and Tommy playing with them...

Goat invasion on bench...

Kimberlyn and Lil' Robby grooming one...

Tommy hunting for kisses...

After and exhausting day...Mom and Dad are helping Tommy to the car!

PONY DELIVERY

The ponies moved in just over two weeks ago on Good Friday.

Ruby came off the trailer supercharged, thankfully she has resumed her sweet disposition here in the last few days.

The girls at home out back, picture taken from our living room window, now this is the life. Ponies in the backyard!!! We are all LOVING IT!
Ruby taking a look at something...

Sweetie taking a snooze...

Tommy turned "cowboy" on us. he wasn't very interested in the horses at the farm in Ohio, things have changed rather drastically and rather quickly. He is a pro at the dismount already too--only from Sweetie though!
This is exactly the reason Kaitlyn made this comment recently...she said "Mom, Daddy's turned horsey on us." She also reminds him he doesn't really "hate horses" as he mumbled all the time during the fence installation as he seems to need his "horsey fix" every night!
That crazy father worked in the rain, sleet and snow LITERALLY to get the fence up for Pony Delivery day! Check out Tommy...shirt, diaper and boots, what more does a country bumpkin need??

Proof of my crazy hubby (with his dad too) working in all weather conditions....

And Triple-back anybody! Ruby is a charm...

Larry got another box checked off on his "Life To-Do List" ~he got to drive a Bobcat! We got a contractor to drill the fence post holes after Larry decided not to kill his back anymore on the drilling himself....
Checking off the list for farm supplies....house not totally unpacked, but by golly we have a nice wheel barrow assembled in our living room!!! And it was tested out on a load of....CHILD :)

Three days....

I have three days to get this blog updated with our busy April. then hopefully will get back on track and blog each event or fun thing in a timely manner.

So here are some fun pictures from Tommy and Mommy's day at the park last week!
April 22, 2009
Tommy has no fear at parks, well anywhere actually! He had a blast on the slides!



He had a grand time jumping, hopping, leaping or HOWEVER he managed to get from the top of this spiral climby thing to the platform all in the few seconds I was looking at the cool picture I just took. I was quite impressed with the sun affect on the below picture if I do say so myself, yes, also quite impressed with Tommy's ability to jump, leap or however w/o crashing down too!!



Since he's the 4th kid, figured this picture could serve the purpose of PROOF! PROOF that the majority of the time we adored and loved him as a sweet, I mean very active toddler. PROOF that he got to do the same fun stuff that our other children did! Seriously, I had a great, wonderfully fun time with him at the park. It's a very rare thing for Tommy and I to have ALONE time.

hmmmm...

I have to believe that this is safer than him wandering off to the kitchen to help himself to snack....kind of like 2 weeks ago when he helped himself to a banana and a knife....


Not thinking Larry will be pleased with me or Tommy. I do believe it's nice to be able to label and cut the pictures of the kids and their cousins from Easter. Next step means I need to MAIL them....

Tommy is being very safe and I don't see an ER visit in the plans for today!! We do plan on visiting the park here shortly...so the plans could change ;) Never know with Tommy!

I'll try to get on here SOON with an update of pictures from Easter and our visit with my brothers.