Zoo day

One of the great things about living in columbus is the Columbus Zoo! We have an awesome zoo here. It was been ranked the #2 zoo in the country for a few years until last week when I read it has jumped up to the #1 Zoo in the country!
Connected to the the zoo is an awesome water park called Zoombezi Bay and a huge Safari golf course.
We have a Zoo membership so we get to go to the zoo whenever we want, and it's only about 20 minutes away. Here are a few pictures of our latest Zoo outing with a buch of our friends.
Here are the kids visiting the monkey's
This is the brand new baby boy elephant..so cute!

All the kiddos! (minus Eli)

Cute baby bunny just chillin on the side of the walk way.

There is a huge reptile building.Weird enough my boys claim to be terrified of all bugs and reptiles but whenever we go to the zoo they insist we visit the reptile building. EVERY TIME!!

Playing with baby ducks

Me and my boys =)

He did it!

Noah is all finished with his first year of preschool! He loved going and he wished he could go everyday! He has learned so much and had so much fun with his school friends and teacher.
We can't wait for preschool to start back up in a few months, and this time both Noah and Eli get to go!!
Here are a couple of preschool pictures.

Soccer Time!!

My friend Kristi had an idea to start our own little soccer team. We have so many 3 and 4 year old little boys around. So every Saturday morning we will get together and do a few little practice drills and then play a 15-20 minute game since that is about all these little boys can handle right now! This last Saturday we went to Kristi's house and she had nets and cones all set up and she taught them how to do a few little drills and talked to them about the basic rules to the game. She even found these cute little soccer jerseys for $1! she got blue and green ones so we can have 2 different teams. It was so fun to watch my boys play their very first soccer game together. Noah was really into it and he was all over the ball. He even made the first goal =)....Eli is not quite 3 years old yet so he doesn't quite have the attention span for this type of thing yet. He was wandering off half of the time and when he did decide to play every time he had the ball and someone kicked it away from him he would cry. It was kind of funny to watch,but hopefully as the weeks go on he will start to understand more of how the game works.
Thanks Kristi, you are an awesome coach! =) Here the kids are during the actual game.

This is them practicing kicking the ball to each other.

Here is Kristi teaching them the rules of the game

Here is Eli crying because someone took the ball away from him..lol

Here are the boys who played this week. We do have a few more boys coming to play so we will hopefully have about 5 kids on each team next week.

GO TEAM!

Kenta and I are so excited for our kids to play soccer. Kenta has always been a soccer player and we have been waiting a long time for them to be old enough to really start playing. After the game saturday I went and bought some soccer nets for the boys so they can practice in the backyard. Noah has been out there practicing quite a bit. He is definitely taking after his daddy. And his Daddy couldn't be more proud! =)

Kai's first 2 teeth

This boy of mine is just so cute! Look closely and you will see his 2 bottom teeth he just got.
Don't you just want to smother him with kisses? I know I do! =)

Meet Abby

This is our new pet frog Abby. This new little friend of ours is named after one of Noah and Eli's BFF's. We had the frog for a little over a day and still had not decided on a name for it. The boy's friend Abby came over to play and I asked her what she thought the frog's name should be and she said without any hesitation "I think it should be Abby". Then she asked Noah and Eli if they liked that name for the frog and they very happily agreed. So that is how our frog got it's name. =)
Abby's dad just got offered a job as a professor at BYU . They are some of our best friend's here and we are so sad that they are moving to Utah soon. Hey but at least we have a frog named in their memory now! Maybe every pet we get from now on will be named after each member of their family! =)
My boys are seriously terrified of all bugs and reptiles. I know its weird, since boys are suppose to be all about that kind of stuff. Noah has always been scared of them and I think his fear just rubbed off onto Eli. I am trying to break them both of this fear. I myself am terrified of spiders and just grossed out by bugs and reptiles. I have been totally sucking it up and holding worms, ladybugs and potato bugs just to try and show my kids that they are not scary. So far neither of them have ever held a bug yet but Eli is now beginning to quickly touch them and poke them. So we are having some progress!
I thought getting a nice friendly frog would be good for them. Maybe it would help them not to be so afraid of everything. Well neither of them have wanted to hold the frog yet but they say they love it and want to keep it. So we will see if they ever get the courage to hold it. =)

Here is the adorable real Abby and her beautiful mommy.

We will miss you Gibb's family!!

Boys will be boys

I love the summer time when the boys can just go out back and play all day in our big fenced backyard. I leave the back door open so I can hear them while I am getting stuff done in the house. The other day I heard them laughing really hard and I went outside to see what was so funny. Well they had decided it would be so fun to run through the big mud puddle and get covered head to toe in mud! It was one of those moments where you don't know if you should be mad because now you have to bathe them and scrub the mud out of their clothes or just laugh because they look so cute. Well I just had to laugh and grab the camera. =)
Not only were they covered in mud but Eli was only wearing his t-shirt while doing this. No pants or underwear. I asked him where they were and he said he went pee outside. I don't know where he gets this from! More than once I have caught him in the nude peeing outside. What is that about!? Really the toilet is not that far away Eli... =)

Congratulations Kenta

Kenta is a college graduate wiith a computer science degree.YAY!!! It feels like he has been in school for forever. I know some of my friends are rolling their eyes right now because your husbands are in medical school/residency , dental school or getting their MBA's but still 6 years of school is a VERY long time!
He did not want to walk which I was bummed about but I thought we needed to do some kind of celebration. So we had a barbecue get together last saturday with a few friends to celebrate.
We all are so proud of you Kenta! Congratulations!

What's next....Information Technology job or graduate school?

Stay tuned.......

Happy Mother's Day

Being a mom takes so much more than I ever imagined. Ihave learned a lot about myself since being a mom. I am really a totally different person than I was 5 years ago, before having kids. My priorities have changed 100%. I have given so much of myself, and I have never been happier. I LOVE being a mom, there really is nothing better. It takes so much work and A LOT of patience, but it so rewarding and makes it all worth it when your kids tell you they love you and give you hugs and kisses. =)
I have the BEST mom in the world. She really is the most giving person I have ever known! She gives so much of herself everday to her 6 kids, 3 grandkids and husband. She is such a good example to me. I love her so much.
I hope all you mom's feel appreciated today..It is our day =) Happy Mother's Day!

So tired.....

Kai had a hard day of playing. It must be so exausting being a baby. =)

Engine House #16

A few days ago we went to the downtown columbus Fire station museum with my good friend Kristi and her kids. It was pretty cool place I must say. It is an authenticaly restored 1908 engine house. It also is a fire prevention learning center.

When we got there a lady gave us a tour of the place and talked about the history of it. We got to see some really old fire engines that were awesome looking and then she gave us a little lesson in fire safety. After that the kids got to dress up in some fire fighting gear and play. All the kids had fun and overall it was an enjoyable afternoon. =)