Thank You Ross and Lucas!!!

Carter LOVES his pet lizard that a co-worker of mine gave to him. Her twin boys catch them at the lake and keep as pets, and Carter was fascinated by them. They were nice enough to give him one of their latest catches.

Carter and Erek - Episode 1889

This video mas made last April but never made it onto the blog site. I went ahead and posted it now so everyone can see how much the boys have grown over the past year!

Flying Fish Boogie

Erek boogies to the blues music at Flying Fish.

Happy Birthday To Me!

Happy Birthday Erek!

Erek turned 3 on Sunday! We celebrated on Saturday at the Memphis Zoo and had a blast. Mommy made a Giraffe cake and a Panda cake:




After everyone arrived we started with lunch - Backpack meals from Backyard Burgers. The kids (and Moms and Dads) got to choose either a hamburger or hot dog. Erek is the hot dog King:



After everyone finished eating, we had a visit from some friends at the zoo. "Billie" and "Bob" brought a variety of wild animals to show the kids. They had the opportunity to get up close and touch:

a chinchilla...


a sand boa...


a carnivorious toad (no touching allowed!)...


a Mexican armadillo...


and a King snake. The kids learned that if a snake is named King or Cobra, it means it grows big enough to eat other snakes!



Happy Birthday Erek!

Guess who's turning 3

Here are a few of Erek's birthday portraits made this week:

Toothless in Somerville

Today on the way home from our day at Pickwick Landing, Carter's loose tooth finally came out somewhere near Somerville, TN. At first he was ecstatic, followed by a short panic when it bled a little, then relieved that it was finally over:




Check out Erek's expression over the gap in his big brother's smile:

We All Scream For Ice Cream

Well, technically it's frozen yogurt but we think it tastes just as good and is 98% fat free (yes, we know it's still about 1000 calories, but at least it sounds healthy). Just a quick post of our little guys enjoying the tastes of summer!

St. Louis Butterfly Garden

One of the things we love about St. Louis is the Butterfly House. Butterfly gardens are hard to come by in Memphis. Both the Botanic Garden and Memphis Zoo used to have open air butterfly gardens. The Botanic Garden still has a butterfly garden listed on their visitors map, but for some reason that area has been overgrown and neglected for the past several years. The Memphis Zoo did away with the butterfly garden a few years ago and Beth and I were very disappointed. Thankfully this summer the Memphis Zoo unveiled their new butterfly exhibit! It's not nearly as nice as the one in St. Louis but at least we have butterflies again!

What makes the St. Louis Butterfly House so nice is that they have a "greenhouse" type structure that makes it possible to exhibit the butterflies year-round. They also have an outdoor natural habitat. Before entering the enclosed exhibit, visitors can view a short movie on the life cycle of the butterfly. The boys love watching this and learn something new everytime they watch it. Here they are as the movie starts:




And here are a few pictures from inside the exhibit:




Here the boys are taking turns identifying butterflies with the chart provided by the Butterfly House:

St. Louis, St. Louis, and more St. Louis

We made a quick trip to St. Louis for Memorial Day weekend and had a blast. Team M loves St. Louis -- it's such a family friendly city and we have visited at least twice a year since the boys have been born. The boys have watched July 4th fireworks under the Arch more times than anywhere else. We've actually been out of town every July 4th for the past seven years.

This trip we visited a site we've never visited before: the City Museum -- it's an incredible place! It's built inside an old 9 or 10 story shoe factory and has three floors of action for the kids. Indoors has a slide three stories tall! It also has an indoor aquarium, including a shark pool. The shark pool has an acrylic tunnel-slide right through it! Here's a picture of the boys coming down the shark tunnel slide (you can see a shark to the far left!):



However, the most fun was in the outdoor jungle maze of steel and iron salvaged from all sorts of buildings and vehicles. The tunnels climb several stories high and connect to towers and airplane fuselages and slides. Carter immediately took off and scaled one of the highest tunnels and raced down one of the many slides. Here he is effortlessly making his way through the tunnel:



Here's Carter helping Richard climb out the tail section of an airplane fuselage (three stories off the ground!):



These photos only represent about 1/100th of the things to do at City Museum. I haven't even mentioned the two-headed snake in the aquarium section, the Everyday Circus, the toddler room, the life-sized whale that you can walk/climb around inside, the kid-sized ride-on train, the underground caverns, etc... We will definitely be coming back on our next trip!

Haircuts For The Boys

Today the boys got their monthly buzz at Funcuts. Carter has been wanting his hair cut short the past few trips "so it will stand up like Daddy's". Since summer break has started, Beth and I agreed to let him get it cut short. Our thinking was that if it didn't look great, at least there's time to let it grow out before school starts again. But Ms. Elaine did a great job as usual and it looks very sporty (he actually looks a year or two younger).




Erek really has no choice but to go short -- else when his hair gets longer it does this weird Einstein/cotton ball thing "just like Daddy's". Erek always looks adorable right after a haircut:

Erek-palooza

Today is a collection of Erek headshots - what a ham!

It's Springtime!!

It was a BEAUTIFUL day today, so naturally we headed straight to the botanic garden.


We've had a couple of weeks a really nice weather, so all the cherry trees and redbud trees were exploding with blooms. Carter said the trees looked they were full of bubblegum, and Erek thought they looked like cotton candy! Hundreds of them showing off their magnificent spring display! We've also been amazed by the wisteria blooms that have appeared seemingly overnight. And the tulips at the garden were gigantic!!


The park was full of people, mostly supporters of a run/walk event that was taking place. We bought a few packs of fish food and headed over to the Japanese garden to feed the koi. Beth and I chanted a plea/prayer that Erek would not end up in the water. It worked, although I think we were only successful in diverting the bad luck to another family next to us, as their little girl did take the plunge. Scared everyone for a second and once she was safe, Beth and I exchanged glances that we were glad it wasn't one of ours for a change!


After our usual trek past the Japanese garden, through the azalea walk, skipping the under-construction butterfly garden (going on three years now?), and meandering through the magnolia grove, we happened upon Carter and Erek's favorite spot: the secret playground (aka, the Prehistoric Plant Trail). Over the past year they have added a few dinosaur-themed additions, and the boys had fun riding the stone dinos.


After playing for a while at the "secret playground", we wandered through the woodland path that leads back to civilization and then headed out. Both boys had a great time and both carried home prized "artifacts", which were nothing more than dried out magnolia tree leaves they picked up on the ground.