Sun Days

I hate being that person who's like, "Hey. Sorry I haven't blogged in forever. I promise to do better."

But. Hey. Sorry I haven't blogged in forever. I promise to do better. Don't hate me. Here's one heck of an update to get you up to speed on all things Excell.

As I said on instagram, "Eli never used to like playing with play dough until my sister told me to add toothpicks into the mix. Best parenting advice I've ever received."

Cheers.

 Watching Jeff leave in the morning.

My failed attempt at a brother photo shoot:

 Successful attempt at a cute Carson pic.

Eli's our coin collector. Whenever he finds money, he runs to put it straight in his piggy bank. I started calling it his mission money and now we sing "I Hope They Call Me on a Mission" every time he adds to his fund. One day he insisted on carrying his piggy bank around with him all day to count his "mission money" over and over.

We love a good game of hide-and-go-seek around here. Mostly because Jeff and I can cram the kids in all the places we wish we could still fit.

Watching the neighbors play basketball -- our favorite activity while we wait for Jeff to get home.

I love this picture.

All the snow melting away put an extra spring in everyone's step. Eli's new shoes helped his steps spring even more.

One Sunday while making popcorn Eli mysteriously started frowning. We laughed and laughed. Then the frown turned into hysterical crying and we realized he had burnt his finger on a hot kernel. Whoops.

Sunshine and bicycles. Happy, happy.

Eli crammed a whole bunch of grapes in his cheeks one day. Then he smiled and I died laughing. He doesn't even look like himself.

Baby model.

New spring clothes! Yup. I bought Eli red pants so we can be trendy twins.

Eli has now successfully gone #2 in the potty 3 times *cough* in one year *cough*. We bribed him with a second trip to D.I. to try to motivate him to ditch the diapers. A year later when he finally earned his second prize, he had quite a hard time deciding what to pick. He took for-ev-er to pick something out. It was funny because it was the first time I felt like he really understood he only got to pick one thing, so he had to test out all the toys to make sure he was getting the best choice for his long awaited prize.

I did a photo shoot with Carson for his first birthday! This beauty came from it:

Here's Eli and his friend. I love this picture. They're like two old men.

We have been in heaven with this warm spell. Jeff's still convinced more snow is on its way, so we have been taking advantage of every warm minute we've been given.

We had our first picnic! Most of the food ended up on the cement, but the kids ate it anyway!

Then Eli lined up all Jeff's tomato cages as a maze for the kickballs. I love to see his little mind work.

They were busy and quiet and concentrated for so long.

Once they got their fill of the kickball maze, the boys used this fake wasp nest as a hat. Then as a kite. I'm starting to be anti-toys because I love to see Eli's imagination go wild with everyday things around the house.

Not sure what he's doing here, but look at his adorable outfit.

Then he found his "telescope." What? How does he even know what a telescope is??

Carson makes weird faces all the time. I figured out he was probably practicing his wink for this fateful moment:

The walks are back. Eli insists we stop and go in conjunction with the traffic light that's aaaaaaaaaaaalllllllllllll the way at the end of the road.

The melting snow reminded us we never got around to raking up the leaves in our yard last fall.

The kids were happy to flop around in the leaves while Jeff tried to contain the mess.

Leaves are really appetizing.

Apparently there are these big trucks that drive around in the middle of the night where we live to kill off all the mosquitos with mosquito killing spray. Apparently those trucks haven't been out yet this year because these aren't chicken pox:

Finally, St. Patrick's Day German Pancake breakfast. That's about as festive as we got around here.

Whew. The end.