Hanging at Higgins

For Father's Day weekend we camped at Higgins Lake with our friends The Brunworth Family and The Grove Family. It poured rain while we were sleeping Friday night, but after that we had beautiful weather and spent a lot of time on the beach.

It's moments like these that make me realize how lucky I am to have these 3 boys in my life.

They were sitting on the beach eating their lunch, looking out over the water and having a casual conversation. I couldn't help taking a picture, just so you could see my world captured in this single shot. I LOVE them!!!

Brycie loves digging in the sand.

He's a little worker bee and was busy building all kinds of things.

Little Lia decided to take a snooze under a shade tree at the beach . . . so cute!

Her big sister Lauren was having a blast with all the boys.
She likes trucks and digging just as much as they do!

Nothing like boys playing a game of Frisbee on the beach.

Blake was buried in the sand and pretended he was a superhero with HUGE muscles

All the kids and Jeff:
I'm pretty certain that Jeff had equally as much fun digging and making a

gigantic hole and canal leading to the water.
In the morning Blake took in a game of baseball. There he is at the end of the bench just waiting for the Big Boys to notice him. He wanted to play soooo bad, but this game was out of his league.

Put me in coach, I'm ready to play!
He eventually gave up and we headed for the swing set instead. Maybe next year, Blake.

Higgins Lake is beautiful, however the campground leaves a lot to be desired. Bryce was begging to go on a boat ride, and I think he had the right idea, Higgins is for people who have boats! That's the only way to truly appreciate the greatness of Higgins Lake.

Any boat owners want to camp with us next year? ;)

Anyway, Happy Father's Day to my Dad, Tim's Dad, and to my husband who is the best Dad I could ask for to my children. We LOVE You!!!!

Crazy Kids

Blake, Bryce, and I had a day at home with nothing on the agenda, ahhh it was nice! We read books, made fun snacks, painted, played baseball, played in the kiddie pool, and rode bikes . . . we kept ourselves busy. They were so goofy, I had to post some of the pics =)

This is how the day started:

Good thing those undies are CLEAN!

Bryce thought it was a good idea to wear his underwear as a beanie

Then, there's my Blake. He never ceases to amaze me with his wardrobe creations. The following look is made up of Navy Blue shorts, Blue long sleeve shirt, blue dress socks pulled waaaaayy up, and a belt undone around his neck.

As you can see he feels really good about himself.

(As I read this blog to him before posting, after hearing the above statement and he snapped his fingers and said, "Now you got it".)

What I really love about the above picture is that Bryce is sitting in the chair looking at him like he's insane and Bryce is rocking a shirt that says, "Smooth like Butta". It cracks me up that this picture speaks volumes to their differences in personality.


Later, they were pleased to get to work creating some, uhh, masterpieces.

Hard at work.

By the way, it is a little known fact that laundry stain remover works well to remove kids paint from carpet. Just sayin.

All in all a great day at home with the boys. I LOVE days off!

Baby Boy at 25 weeks

Baby Boy is doing great! We saw the doctor yesterday, his heart rate was 155, and he was moving around like a crazy animal caught in a trap. It's quite entertaining as the Medical Assistant chases him around with the doppler and watches with wide eyes as my stomach is visually jolting every which way as baby boy tries to find his comfort zone. He's definitely an active little guy.
Baby and I are happily living in harmony these days: My blood pressure was perfect, 110/52, and my weight is . . . well, let's just say I'm excelling in that area! I finally stopped throwing up and I had a hungry month, okay?!
We have his name narrowed down to 2 choices and we most likely won't decide until we see his little face. I am also working on getting his room ready. I have the bedding, but still working on paint color and theme. So much fun getting ready for our little man :) I'll keep you posted.

Mackinac Island Wedding

Tim and I went to Mackinac Island over the weekend to see 2 friends, Brian & Katie, get married. It was so beautiful, the perfect setting with more than perfect weather, and they make the perfect match. Congratulations to Mr. & Mrs. Gist!

I was able to steel a moment with the Groom

Tim and I outside the resort where they were married

(Great shot, Jenni, thanks)

Tim was thrilled to have his picture taken by the bridge, ha ha

Tim & the beautiful Bride

Just us, again. I look like I indulged in a little too much fudge!

Brad & Monica the night before the wedding . . . not sure why I don't have a picture these two all dressed up, cuz they looked GOOD!

So much FUN!

Rolling Stones

We've been doing our best to roll with the punches around the O'Mara household, but let me tell ya sometimes it ain't so easy. I started all the fun last week with kidney stones on Wednesday and was relieved when they finally passed at 4:30am on Friday. I was quite uncomfortable for those few days and never having experienced kidney stones I wasn't quite sure what the problem was, but it all made sense in the end. Next, to stay on the topic of kidneys, Bryce has wet the bed twice this week. However, from his perspective he becomes quite upset at 2:30am when he insists he did not wet the bed, he clearly explains that the bed got him wet. Twice in one night. Ugh, back to pull ups. We have Bryce who won't take responsibility for his actions, while our oldest boy carries the weight of the world on his shoulders.
Poor sweet Blake has become a paranoid germ-a-phobe. He has been this way for a while (uh, no coincidence I work in Infection Control and am somewhat of a freak myself), but after the lesson on germs in preschool he has taken it to a whole new level. He tells me at least 30 times a day that he has snot on his shirt, that he sniffed when he should have blown his nose, that his sandwich touched his shirt, etc. etc. He even keeps his pants down around his ankles after going to the bathroom and hobbles over to the sink with his hands in the air to wash them because he is afraid to get germs on his pants. I think I have him talked out of this practice now, but it is a struggle to get him to relax and understand that some germs are good. I'm seriously exhausted after the discussions with him as he listens intently, questions every explanation, then when I think we've made progress he walks away and says, "I still don't like germs." And the cycle continues.
Besides this germ obsession he is becoming quite social. Erica and I took the kids to a restaurant for lunch and he was quick to tell the waitress that he is 5 years old, is all done with preschool, and is heading to kindergarten in the Fall. Just after she leaves our table he calls out to her, "And I'm a MAN". I think she was impressed :)
I can't leave Tim out, he's been so busy with work that his cell phone goes off all night long. One night it went off 6 times from 1am - 5am. I am very thankful that he has a job given the current state of our economy, however, I would truly appreciate it if his job would leave us alone when we are trying to sleep!