The Regan Family: To Infinity and Beyond

As Tom informed me yesterday, “You haven’t done a blog post in a while”…

So, while I don’t have a lot of material, here’s what we’ve been up to the past few weeks.

For Father’s Day, I had this great idea to take pictures of the kids with their hands outstretched and then framing it and writing on the frame: “We love Daddy this much”.

Here were my first few attempts to get that pose…

Wow, as I look back over these pictures of her I think I’d like to frame these anyway, just because she’s so darn cute :)

This is Marlo’s new little coy expression…I just want to kiss her little face!

This is actually the picture I chose to use, but it ended up being the 2nd runner up…

This is the picture I eventually put in the frame for Tom, and we just wrote “We love Daddy” on it…

If you stop by our house at any given point lately, you will catch Ty or Marlo (or maybe a few others…) “hulking up”, displaying those impressive muscles!

(I’m so glad this Windows Live Writer gives me the option to make a picture MUCH smaller, because I cannot believe I let Tom take that picture of me!)

A few weeks ago we went to the first Music Night at the Park at Ault Park…

I do not have any pictures of the music and dancing, or the fun playing on the HUGE hill, but I do have pictures of a fun little character they met…

We also had to get a new little chair for the kids (from Ikea, one of their favorite places to run amok!) Even though I put it by the window and bookshelves in the playroom, Marlo has decided she likes it out in the great room.

A very popular activity lately has been playing in the ~~trickling hose~~ pool and sprinkler toy at GG and Grandpa’s!

Thanks Grandpa for setting up this elaborate baseball game/sprinkler! It took a few times to get everything to stick together right.

After they played in the pool for about 2 seconds, we changed them into regular clothes..only to have them 2 minutes later go play in the trickling hose :) That was the best idea ever, thanks GG!

Look at the little munchkin running around with her little cup of water :)

Cousin Gunnar was there to join in the mischief…I think there may have been water dumped on heads, water dumped on butts, water smacked on heads (thanks Ty for teaching Gunnar that one!)…

Here is my favorite Gunnar-ism…”oooooooohhh”

I love that there will be so many fun cousins to grow up with :)

Gunnar and Louie having a little cha cha cha…

For the longest time we had been anticipating the premiere of Toy Story 3. We really built it up for Ty-we bought the DVD combo pack of 1 and 2. He definitely got into the fun and magic of the movie, and I’m so glad because it is actually a classic that I think will be around for a very, very long time. So…Amanda and I had been planning to take the boys to see 3 in the theater as soon as it came out. So on a very rainy, stormy afternoon we took the boys to see it, and all I can say is…WOW. Wow because it was SUCH an incredibly cute movie, so tender and heart warming and still retained that awesome humor and nostalgia from the first two films. And also WOW because Ty sat through the entire thing with ~~almost~~ not a peep. He was entranced! Trent had brought his plush Buzz and Woody, and since they have fully decided that Trent IS Woody and Ty IS Buzz, they each held onto their respective doll the entire time.

We tried really hard to get a picture of them in front of the cardboard “3” and the lineup of characters, but it became too much of an ordeal-with Ty initiating the kicking of the cardboard characters! STINKER!

Aw, Trent gave a great smile :)

Here they are leaving the theater, I just had to snap this picture of them still clutching their Buzz and Woody as they left :)

As many of you know, I’m having ~~an unbelievably HORRENDOUS~~ a hard time potty training Ty, so Tom decided to take matters into his own hands….

He told him if he peed in the potty (which he had only done ONCE before this) he would buy him an Escalade. Did you hear me correctly?? Because I wasn’t quite sure what I was hearing when Tom told me about his purchase! AN ESCALADE! So…after a few days of seeing it sitting in the garage, in the box, Ty was so moved and affected by the ~~bribe~~ vehicle that he in fact made the much awaited pee pee in the potty…

Hopping in the door…

Turning up the tunes (this thing has LOUD speakers!)

And they’re off!

On another congratulatory note, Ty is enrolled in the Summer Reading Program at the Public Library. Every time he reads 5 books he progresses to the next level. He is keeping track of his reading on a worksheet with bubbles that he colors in, and I record them online as well. His first level was a pair of sunglasses, 2nd level a squirt toy, 3rd level a coloring book and crayons, 4th level a free book and the 5th level was this sign…he was SO EXCITED to get this! Every level after this is an entry in the grand prize drawing for an art easel.

Who remembers Ty’s first Hyde Park Blast race??? Well, he came back for a repeat performance! I ran the race first at 8am, and then we all convened at our friend’s house very near the square. After some playtime we took the kids back to the square to run the kids version of the race. The 2-3 year old group was to begin at 10am (a 25 yd dash), and each age group was to follow a few minutes after. We got there at 9:50 and they started the 2-3 year olds just as we walked up! Bummer. So we scooted the boys, Ty and PJ, into the 4-6 year old group!

Packing up the stroller to head to the square, Marlo will be a fierce contender next summer!

There’s JD, in yellow, running with PJ in his arms!

The BEST part of the race, by far, is the medal and the water bottles, OF COURSE!

And guess what? Another evening of playing in the trickling sprinkler at GG and Grandpa’s!

Look at that wet heiny!

Ty and Gunnar seem to always go after the same tiny little cup :)

We were outside playing the other night and Tom caught a glimpse of a mama deer and her little fawn taking a little break in our street…

The little baby nursed for quite a while, even while seeing me snapping pictures of them! Then just like any good mama, it was as if she said to her young one, “Get your bum out of the street, and look both ways while you’re at it!”