Swimming Lessons

I have to say my boys are all part fish, in order to be able to use the water slides and not be watched over by Me at the lifetime pool they have to do a swimming test which is swimming 25 meters without touching the wall, lane line or feet on the bottom of the pool, now Kodi took it the first time we went outside to use the pool, KK on the other hand did not I wasn't sure if he would be able to make it, but sure enough on our next visit he mastered that and was so very proud of himself.
He made good use of the slides that day and continues to excel in class, I had another parent check with me to really make sure he was suppose to be in his class Yes he is only 4 just a very big 4 year old.
Peyton still wears his floaty at times but is doing great he just moved up to the older class even though he is not technically the right age the aquatic manager gave us the Ok to move up. He has no fear and can already swim without me. I don't leave him alone in the pool or anything I am right there with him but he loves to jump and turn around and swim back to the side of the pool. He truly has no fear in the water.
Kodi is working on his dolphin kick and frog legs but he loves it. Once he has mastered those two skills he will be moving up to swim team. Both my boys want to so bad to swim on the team, I love it.  With the Olympics coming they are super excited to be swimming and want to swimmers.

Summertime in MN

We have loved every minute here well at least the boys have I have been having  harder time being here I am just plan ready to be stationed and have our family back together. We have another 6 months before that will happen but I am making the most of it here with my family.   We have been keeping busy with playing with cousins going to the gym and enjoying being able to play outside in a much safer neighborhood. I love how my boys will just want to go out and play ride their bikes go in the tree house. I don't even have to say much about going out they just do, a very different from out home in VA.
I have been running alot and will be continue to run my long term goal is the Goofy race in January it's a half and full Marathon with a day in between which is why it's called the Goofy. I just did the Torchlight 5k last night and did my best time PR for me :)   so happy I have 5 minutes to shave off my time to finish under 30 minutes. 
The boys have loved their summer days of playing and swimming which we do alot of. We are either at the lifetime pool, beach or the hanus pool. KK is quite the swimmer he has passed this swim test at the club which was swimming 25 meters all by hiself without holding the sides or touching the ground. He now can go down the slides and swimming without me being right there. He is a little fish in the water.  Peyton is also a fish he has NO fear of the water, will jump off into the pool or lake and just bounce right back up and swim back to me. He is ready for individual lessons but has to wait until he is 3 I am thinking of doing private lessons with him and KK. Kodi is almost to swim team he has to master frog legs for the breast stroke and breathing and will be able to move up to swim team as well. I love having swimmers it's not only a wonderful skill to have but a great workout. I was a swimmer and love it. I have started to swim again and realize how much I missed it. 
Aaron will be able to come home again for Labor day and we are counting down the Fridays until the boys see him. 

It's been awhile

It's been a while since I last posted things have been crazy at our house and I should be better at posting what is going on.
We had a wonderful Christmas and a Great New Year, Aaron and I ran the Beat the Ball 5k which was a blast, we started at 11:30 I was done just after midnight, Aaron finished in 29 minutes for him it was a good time he had been battling a cold and didn't feel well at all, but wanted to run anyway, our boys on the other hand were in bed and sleeping by 8 it made it an easy night for our wonderful Babysitter.
We still don't have any orders yet so we will try next month, we are truly blessed to have Aaron working in the Career Counselors office and they are working and making sure we get what we want. Right now he is at more training and has been doing great. We are very excited to be going back home to Minnesota for 3 weeks in March, Erica is getting married, Haleigh is getting baptized, Katy is having her baby and we are running the Lucky 7 and KK's 4th birthday Party. So much to stuff into three weeks but it will be great to be surround by our family again.
Peyton has been pretty healthy and hasn't needed to have another dilation which is wonderful it's been a year since his last one and he is doing great. He has started speech and he loves his therapist Liz, he is being seen twice a week, we are trying to get the in home speech program through the city so I don't have be out at therapy 4 times a week. He does qualify for it we just need to do the educational interview and than they will set up his speech in home.
KK is KK we finally took the boys into the eye doc and found that Kodi has great eye sight and KK has astigmatism so he has very cute glasses and loves that he can see. He is doing great on learning his colors and ABC's. He loves playing and of course watching TV. He is also 4 inches shorter than Kodi I believe that Kodi is 41 inches and KK is 37 or 38 inches tall. I have very tall boys. It's hard to remember that KK is only 3 and not older, soon enough he will be 4 and he is looking forward to his birthday.
Kodi is doing great he LOVES school and his teacher, he works hard and enjoys learning. He grades are great and he is working hard to do his best. His speech is coming along and he loves Tia his therapist, His OT is great he doesn't like that he has to miss school for OT and just wants this therapy with Rhonda to be shorter like Speech, but we do our best and he is coming along.
He is reading and loves it when he finds words he knows. I know that reading will be a harder task for him and we are doing our best to teach him and give him the tools he needs.
I hope to do more posting and be better at it.

Happy Birthday Dakota

Yes, we all know that time flies by as we get older, but it really does seem like yesterday that we brought our little son home from the hospital. He is now 6 years old. He is a joy in our life yes at times he is pushing my buttons and doesn't want to listen and with this SPD life gets hard but I wouldn't trade him in for anything.

I love who he is and who he is becoming. It is the sweetest thing to listen to him remind us at family prayers to pray for a family in our ward who has a sick daughter and this friends dad who is looking for a job, and Jackson who is a friend to get better. Now he doesn't just pray that they will get better but for what each person needs.

I love the faith he has and the wiliness he has to listen to the spirit.

It was his day today and I allowed him to do whatever he wanted. So we watched some TV put together his little box of Lego's (I left the big Lego box for Aaron to put together with Kodi). The only thing I won't let him not do is he had to go to OT today and he loved it, he did a great job and I can already see the difference it makes. He is calmer and more together when we are done. It just reminds me that we need to do more sensory diet during the day. He really does need it.

We than picked up Aaron who had a flat tire on the way home from work let him change and off to Chuck E Cheese for his birthday. All three boys loved it and the place was pretty empty.

It was a good night and a great birthday for him.

His party is on Saturday and it's going to be great, fun he wants a Angry Birds party so that is going to be a great time.

Happy Birthday my son I love you and I am so happy you decided to join our family

HOLY COW IT"S HOT HERE

So we finally got the heat wave the rest of the country has been feeling and man is it hot. We are totally crazy and decided yesterday we should visit the zoo. Yes totally crazy it was great since not alot of people were there but man was it hot out. The best part of the time was we actually got to see the two tigers out and playing. They played in the pool and it was so very cool. Usually they are either sleeping or you can't find them.
The boys played in the fountains at the zoo and we than looked for feathers from the Peacocks and went into the reptile rooms which was nice and cool. Over all we spent 3 hours walking around and drinking so much water. We stayed hydrated and we didn't get sick. The boys did a great job walking around and riding in the strollers.
We than came home and cleaned up the house and watched a movie night, we also watched a very cool lightening storm. Got a good amount of much needed rain and went to bed. It was over a very good day. I love our zoo it's small enough to walk around in about 2 hours and the boys love it. I took KK on Wednesday since Kodi was at a friends house and he loved being in charge of what we do. I want to do a lesson for them on the different animals they love.

And we are OFF

We have been training for our three different races this summer, and actually we just added a 4th race. The First one was last Saturday Aaron and I both did a 5k and Kodi did a 1 mile fun run.

I was so very proud of Kodi he didn't run the whole way but did his best and loved getting the metal at the end.

Aaron was done first before me and I was only about 7 minutes behind him. I am loving my running, I love the fact that we run as a family. We love to run down at Mount Trashmore and the boys will sit in the strollers while we run and their reward after we are all done is to play on the huge playground. Which they love.

Our next race is set for August 13th and this one is an 8k mudd run. I can't wait we are going to be entering as a couple and have to finish together. I know I run slower than Aaron but I am just excited to be able to do the mudd run. Kodi isn't sure if he wants to do the kid mile mudd run. I would love him to do it and try, but he is scared of the mudd. Maybe we can work on this with this OT.

Than at the end of Sept we are taking a disney Disney and will be running two races. A 5k in the morning and than Aaron and I have entered a half marathon relay that night. I am so very excited. Not only have I been losing weight I am getting in shape and I love how I am feeling. My boys notice I have more energy and I am happier.

I have the wonderful shin splints and have had to take some time off from running I bough some wonderful shin sleeves and those work so very well. The heat is taking a huge amount of energy out of me, and with it being so very hot we have not been able to run this week. If it was just Aaron and I running it would be different I would run my 30 minutes and make my 5k but with the kids just sitting and Peyton's breathing we aren't going to be taking any chances. He is doing pretty well we are back to nebing him once a day and allergy meds at night.

But other than that this is the longest he has gone without needing to see the ENT. We are getting excited about moving in January we still only have verbal orders to Indian Head, MD and we can't wait. It looks beautiful and I hear it's great. Not any closer to my family or Aaron's and it looks like we won't be heading WEST anytime soon. Aaron is still planning on going to medical school and has about two years of pre-med he has to do. So Starting this fall he will be in school again. Can't wait for that part to be all over, and the med school he is trying to get into Uniformed Services University of Health Science. It is a long road ahead of us but we still feel that is where the Lord wants us.

Growing up way to fast

It seems that my kids won't stop growing, Peyton is getting big but at the same time is only in the 22% for his age my little bug is so small. Kingston is HUGE he is so tall, he come up to Kodi's chin. I have to remind myself he is only 3 and not 4 or 5. Kodi is also tall and skinny he is wearing 6/7 pants but the waist doesn't fit him.
Kingston is now potty trained and loves being a big boy. We are working on not fighting, so I came up with a sticker chart for the both of them and if it's full by the time our Disney trip comes in Sept than they will get to build a light-saber, which they are both excited for.
I seem to be getting older as well I can't believe it's that time again for my birthday and well when I was younger it seemed like "forever" for my birthday to come around again and now it takes no time at all my birthday to come again.
Yesterday was a great day, my lesson in primary was a Big hit with both senior and junior primary. Junior was into a little more than senior but either way we learned about the temple and how important it is to be sealed to your family.
I found a great idea on sugardoodle.net and used it. I had a picture of the temple under a blanket and told the kids it was a gift from Heavenly Father and they had to guess what it was. Once we figured out it was a the temple they told me why it this gift was so very important. Than I had a handful of kids come put and we made a family we had a and the kids linked arms and they had to walk around together they were "sealed" together. Of course jr thought it was so cool and Sr. well the it was " I don't want to touch girls" of course they were all good sports and did it anyway.
Next I had a ziplock bag and I put in "Lifesavers" the bag and told the kids it was their family and than I dumped the bag on the floor and the family wasn't together anymore. Picking up the family I put them back into the bag and "sealed" the bag shut tried to dump out the family again and couldn't because the bag was "sealed", I asked the kids if they wanted to be sealed to their family and made the kids bags of family and we sealed them up too.
So much fun, I loved being in primary and teaching the kids.