Once again, I fell off the wagon (in reference to writing blog posts.)  Sorry folks, I guess we have been enjoying the summer too much!  My little man has been obsessed with bubbles, I think we have blown bubbles everyday this summer so far (in between the daily thunderstorms and rain.)  So we dipped his hands in the bubble mixture, thus allowing him to hold these wonderful things.  Ahhh, the simplicity of life when you are little.  Don't blink, the summer is quickly disappearing!

Thought I would share some photos of our little big boy enjoying the summer.  Digging the flowerbeds with Dad, getting super dirty, playing in the sprinkler and all things that make you think "summer."  Can you remember that feeling when school was over and you thought, "I have the whole summer off" and then before you knew it...time to go back to school.  The summer is already flying by, so I guess we better enjoy it before it is gone.  Our yard has been filled with rabbits, squirrels, birds, turtles, skunks and snakes, thankfully less skunks and snakes than the others, but still too many of them to be happy about, thankfully we haven't been sprayed yet!  Hope you are enjoying your summer fun.

  Apologies, apologies, I have been absent from my blog lately and I am truly sorry, I guess the summer is getting the best of me!  I just finished planning and throwing a friend's baby shower at my house, my husband's Grandfather took a spill and has been in the hospital (trying to recover) for almost three weeks and we have been going to Baton Rouge more often to visit him in the hospital, and all the other things involved with summertime activities!  I do hope to be more "present" and share in all that is going on, so here we go!

We attended a birthday party this past weekend, held at a bowling alley in Baton Rouge.  They had lightweight balls, the bumpers up, and this cool device for helping children roll the ball.  My son "got it" from the second we slapped the bowling shoes on his feet.  He was so excited and did it all on his own, though he could care less if he knocked down any pins, he was just happy to roll the ball down the lane over and over again.  Too bad they only let you bowl for one hour and once that hour is up...no more bowling, so you can guess how that went, let's just say the terrible two's showed their ugly head, and it involved rolling around on the floor, screaming and crying!  I guess you get the good with the bad, too bad I didn't think to take pictures of the tantrum!  Oh well, maybe we will only remember the happy times.

Ever wonder "Who exactly is Marci...is she real?"  Well here I am, in all my fuzzy photo glory!  When I started this blog back in February, I went through a years worth of photos and couldn't find a single decent photo of myself (the 5 that existed were really bad,)  so last night after our baths my husband snapped this photo of me, our little boy and his puppy (or as he pronounces it peepe!)  That explains the lack of clothes (I do have on shorts,) bare faces (yep, no make-up) and scraggly hair. You know how it goes though, you get a good picture taken, and of course it turns out slightly blurry...oh well, you win some, you lose some!  The picture below is our ole' bear showing off his brand new (overpriced) pajamas that feature our Alma Mater (The University of Louisiana, Ragin' Cajuns!)  He sure does like them, and we thought he looked pretty spiffy also!

As a family, we took a trip this weekend to Lake Charles, LA (about an hour west of Lafayette) to one of Louisiana's great state parks, Sam Houston.  It is a real beauty, quiet, peaceful, fun and relaxing!  This park features tons of walking trails, campsites, cabins for rent, boating and much more.  We spent the day with my mom and step-dad and some of their friends (and grandchildren) and truly had a great time.  Our son loves other children, so he had a blast on the playground equipment (this park has three separate playgrounds) and getting completely dirty and full of sand.  His shoes were literally FULL of sand!  We enjoyed seeing the sites, great food, peaceful surroundings and time with family.  The day wrapped up with lovely sitings of ducks, geese, plenty of squirrels and quite a few deer.  The photos that I took of the deer were truly that close, literally 3 feet away from our running car, talk about some tame deer!  Our son loved seeing the animals and watching Grammie feed them!  If you are ever in the neighborhood, you should truly check this great state park out, it is definitely worth the trip!

Wait a second, is that what I think it is...yes, yes it is, my son in our new ginormous mailbox.  This mailbox is the latest addition to the family, and is a big help to me and my sanity, you see this huge mailbox is saving me trips to the post office, and that is a big deal.  Before when I would sell something in my store, it almost always required a trip to the post office, then I discovered you could print your postage online...oh yes, but I still had the issue of my packages being jammed into a tiny mailbox, thus I was still occasionally having to go to the post office.  If you children, you know what a huge pain in the rear end the post office can be, especially when our local one always has a line a mile long!  So anyways, my husband was shopping in Lowe's discovered this huge baby and purchased it for me...how sweet.  Most women get flowers, candy, no not me, I got a huge mailbox, and was just as happy!

Does it get any better than this...nope.  Simply delicious ice cream bar, Dad letting me pig out, oh so good!  Loving the spring weather, enjoying the weekend, having a blast!  Off for more adventures!!

Simply put, this is part of our yard, full of "blow blows," and our ole' bear loves it!  Frolicking, running, picking, blowing and all the fun stuff involved with the yearly ritual of "blow blows!"  Oh...to be that carefree and innocent again!

My son has been infatuated with the movie "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs," and if you have seen the movie you are aware that there is a "Jello" scene.  Well, after the millionth viewing of the movie, my husband and I realize that our son has never had Jello, so now we know what we have to do...make Jello!  So, one evening my husband makes a batch of Jello, it hardens overnight, and the next day we decide to introduce Jello to my son's repertoire of foods.  Have a peek at the photos and you can guess how this went.  At first he was interested in this squiggly substance and even decided to get some on the spoon and have a bite, but after his first bite he wasn't impressed at all.  He poked and prodded it a lot, but wouldn't eat it at all.  I mean really, look at that face, totally not impressed.  So guess who ended up eating it...that's right Mom and Dad.  Oh well, maybe next time...

Look at that grin...yum chocolate Easter bunny for breakfast, what could be better than that?  He is still to young to understand Easter fully, but he sure did enjoy waking up to Easter baskets of candy and toys from the Easter bunny.  We spent the day at my mom's house (the first time we have celebrated Easter at her house in 10 years,) had a simple cookout of hamburgers and hotdogs and then hunted eggs!  Ole boy really enjoyed hunting the eggs once he realized they were full of candy (candy that was rapidly melting in the sun!)  He did have a hard time understanding the concept of putting the eggs in the basket, he just wanted to carry all of his found treasures by hand.  After a day of candy and egg hunting, he slept peacefully all the way home.  We had a beautiful Easter and I hope that you and your family also had a wonderful day!