Chuck E. Cheese

Tanner loved riding in this jeep and Andrew stood next to him because it was so high off the ground until I asked Andrew to come play air hockey with me. Bad idea! Tanner tried getting out by himself and fell leaving a huge purple goose egg on his head. I'm such a bad mom!
Tanner and Carlaya in a motion ride. This let us view there faces. I missed when they really got into it!
Beat em' down!
Picking awesome prizes with their tickets they own!

Andrew, Tanner, Benson, and me went with my sister Camille, and her family, Jonathan, Carlaya and Noah to Chuck E. Cheese the day we flew into Vegas. We all had a fun time together. Tanner had a rough time with falling out of the jeep and also crawled up into the play place and got scared to go down the covered slide (long story but he's scared of covered slides) so he started screaming and Andrew had to go up the slide to pull him down. It was kind of funny though. Somebody needs to toughin' up that kid!

Benson's 1st plane ride

I was really nervous taking Benson on a plane with him being so new and everyone breathing in the same air. Benson did really good though and slept almost the entire time, but other things went wrong...
First off we were late getting to the airport, checking in at 6:02 AM and the plane boards at 6:30. Putting us 2 minutes late for check in and they said it was not a guarantee that our luggage would be on that flight. (We had been standing there at the counter for 10 minutes) Then it's ALWAYS a pain to go through security and even worse with two kids. They even made me unwrap Benson from the blanket because they wouldn't let it go through the metal detector. We finally got seated on the plane, listened to how not to kill yourself in case of an accident, and were next up for take off when the pilot came on the intercom and said a light was on that wasn't supposed to be on and we would have to go back and get it checked. It turned out to really be a problem and they made us all get off the plane and wait for almost an hour for another plane. We got settled onto our new plane and listened to "how to breathe properly" again. FINALLY take off!!! But of course it can't be that wonderful. A man sitting right behind Andrew was snoring so LOUD within 5 minutes and snored THE WHOLE WAY. Then his lovely wife coughed the whole way making the hair on top my head blow with her yakking every time and giving my new baby a full years worth of virus and bacteria all at the same time. When my prayers were answered and the plane finally hit down in Las Vegas I was joyful! Until everyone jumped up crowding the isle for 15 minutes. The lovely couple behind us were hanging completely over Andrew's seat, touching my seat (and still yakking) and the oxygen in the plane was getting sucked out fast with everyone breathing letting in the stench of old leather and plane peanuts fill the air. I was getting claustrophobic quick. And then the plane cleared... and we were off, all of our luggage made it with us and we were greeted by lovely Camille in the hot DRY air of Nevada!
The great joys of flying!

Camera cord???

Well I have a TON of new pictures to post, but can't find my camera cord. So when I do... look out because I will have million posts.

BROTHERS!

I am so grateful Tanner hasn't been resentful of Benson. If anything I think he has been showing even more love. He loves holding his little brother and giving him LOTS of kisses!

Pirate's Cove

So we went and swam at Pirate's Cove Water Park yesterday and I don't think that we will go back. There was some good things about it like... Tanner had fun and there was a cool boat slide. Then there was the bad like... 1)them charging Tanner and Benson to get in (Both are under two and Benson's in a infant carrier!), 2)the life guards fanny pack covers more of them than their swimming suit does, 3) Ummm... I think I will leave the rest out!

We will stick to Papio Bay or other water parks next time. It was good friends were there to have fun with!

"Lets Go Fly a Kite!"

Our friends Allie and Mitch bought a kite for their boys, so we all went out to watch them fly it. It worked pretty good and the kids all enjoyed it, but were ready to go before the MEN were! T

Our cute boys!

I laid Benson down on Andrew's chest and Tanner thought he needed to do the same. As you can see, he thought it was pretty cool having his brother lay on him.

A break for Mom... yes!
Chowing down
It's tough being a boy sometimes. Tanner was running with his friend Jackson when he fell down and got a big goose egg and scrapped knees. Then after coming inside he ran into the corner of the table and received another Ouchy (but that one was an indention). And finally to top off the day, he tried getting a string cheese out of the fridge and instead of opening the drawer for under the handle he tried going from the top and smashed three fingers leaving them very purple and hurt!
I'm a deep thinker
"All this space to myself? And Tanner can't even reach me! I'll be sleepin' good tonight!"

1 month old!!!

On the 5th Benson turned 1 month old.

Not the best picture, but I forgot (was too busy) and didn't take a better one later!

The 4th of July

Tanner, Andrew, Mitch, Creighton, and Jackson

For the 4th we went to Papio Bay water park with a few other friends and their kids. Tanner had fun going down the little butterfly slide a MILLION times. There was some bigger slides but Andrew was afraid to take him down them for fear it would scare Tanner like it did on a huge slide at the Great Wolf Lodge. So he didn't risk it. I sat and watched while Benson stayed covered in his carseat most of the time. We then had a little BBQ and went to watch the fireworks go off from Rosenblatt down the street in a field. I had Andrew go and park the car a couple hours early so Benson and I could sit in there and watch without getting eaten alive by mesquitos. It was a fun day for us all.

The College World Series

Andrew and Tanner were able to attend two College World Series games. Andrew thought it was great, Tanner did for the first hour of each game then was ready to be picked up. Andrew didn't even buy the tickets, his friend game him two for game 10 (North Carolina vs. LSU ) and his boss gave him tickets for game 11 (Georgia vs. Stanford ). So that was nice. The only good thing I thought about the games. We live just across the freeway from the stadium. So for over a week it was impossible to go anywhere quick because you were constantly stuck in terrible traffic.

Catching up... A day in the Gardens

After I had Benson and Camille was out here; Andrew, Tanner, and Camille went to the Botanical Garden's playground and train display and had a lot of fun. Back at home I caught up on some much needed rest while Benson napped too!

90 MPH winds= A lot of damage!

This branch missed this car by less than a foot!

Three trees in front of our building went down like dominos

Our friends the Evers. It's their house with the big pine blocking the front of it. (They still don't have power!) Everyone came out to help clean up all of the trees.

So yesterday evening we were sitting outside cleaning up our patio when the tornado sirens sounded, but the weather looked great. Andrew turned on the TV to see what was going on and it said 90 mph winds were coming, to get inside and to stay away from the windows. About 5 minutes later we could see the clouds just rolling towards us pretty quickly. I got out the video camera and started taping when Andrew said we needed to get inside. I called him a chicken and kept taping, he pulled me in, so I went to the back door to get more video. But as soon as I opened the door it started raining so hard and debris was hitting the glass. He yelled at me to get Benson and he grabbed Tanner and we all ran down to the basement. The storm sounded so loud. After a few minutes Andrew went up and said that trees were down. We all came up to see the damage and this is what we saw. There was hail the size of quarters, branches everywhere, I guess even a swing set went through someones window, and our power was out for almost 24 hours. The people across the street still don't have power along with many more people from Omaha and Council Bluffs.

Last night when we didn't have power, we got out candles for some light but I could only find one of our flashlights. So we drove to a Walmart south of us (who still had power) to get a lantern so we would have good light for the kids. I can see now why the church says, "BE PREPARED". It was a zoo in the camping isle. I got the last battery operated lantern, more than half the flashlights were gone, and people were going crazy everywhere. Many people asked me where I had gotten my lantern, which I had to say, "Sorry but it's the last one!"
Once I got the lantern I headed to get batteries that were also cleaned out. Luckily I remembered they keep batteries by the toys and bought the last two packs of D cells.

So a message to all... "BE PREPARED!" This was nothing compared to what will come!

Good Times