Beautiful blooms

So far today has been a great day. The kids and I spent some quality time together playing this morning. I simply love those type of mornings. This afternoon we headed into St. Joe to a "End Of Treatment" party for a friend of mine's son, Carter, who just finished his maintenance treatments for Leukemia. Woohoo, Carter is cancer free and lovin' every minute of it...and so are his family and friends! Way to go Carter!

Grant and Audrey were wiped out after all of that playing at the park and they fell asleep in the car on the way home so I have had some time to do some cleaning, laundry and now blogging! Woohoo for me!

To change things up a bit, I thought I would share some pictures taken around my yard. I am a bit of a flower freak as you will soon find out.

I have an array of perennials and annuals and every year I choose a color theme for my annuals.

This year's colors {if you can't tell already!} are red, orange and yellow.

This is the first time I have ever used oranges and yellows so it was interesting picking out my flowers this spring.

I was forced to buy some varieties of flowers that I had no experience with, but is actually proved to be quite fun.

Above and below are various colors of marigolds {yes, the stinky ones!} and I always swore that I would never plant them, but I actually really like them. They are super easy to grow and I really like how they compliment each other in these pots.

Since I do not have a garden {mark my words, someday I will} I grow a few tomato plants in pots alongside the house. I usually do grape and cherry tomatoes because my dogs both love to eat them right off the plant, but this year I went with cherry and big boys. As you can see they aren't ripe yet, but they sure are going to be yummy!

Had to throw this one in there too. Grant snatched the cat and said, "Hey Mom! Take a picture of me and Trixie!" So I did exactly that.

Just a few more pictures of the flowers.

Believe me, I did not take pictures of all of them or we'd be here all day!

But maybe I will share a few more another time.

As for the rest of tonight...the hubby just called and said he was finally on his way home.

He told me to have a cold beer waiting for him when he gets here. That actually doesn't sound too bad. I think I just may have to join him!

We are also grillin' pork chops for dinner and then maybe having a little bon fire with the kids in this little fire bowl.

Hopefully the skeeters won't be too bad tonight. With the rain we have been getting lately, they are terrible around dusk.

Then, we promised Grant that we would camp out with him on the porch (4 season, fully enclosed...its actually more like our living room) on the hide-a-bed and watch spider man.

Have I ever mentioned that I loooove weekends and spending time with my family??

If not, I really should!

Born to be a biker!

If ever anyone was born to be a biker like his Daddy...I'm guessin' it is this little Firecracker {HA...read his shirt. I crack me up!}

Grant got this motorcycle to ride on into our wedding when he was 20 months old. He wasn't the best driver so we had the bike attached to a large, cloth covered piece of plywood on wheels (float style) and he was pulled in. I'll have to share those pictures some day too. He was so cute in his little tuxedo!

I digress.

On this particular day, he decided to give his sister a ride. The funny thing is...the bike is only a one seater! Tootie's face had "Are you sure this is a good idea?" written all over it!

It' didn't take her long and she got much more relaxed.

But I couldn't get her to smile or to hold on to her brother.

Good thing the bike moves about as fast as a turtle with two kids on there!

I just treasure the times when they actually play together and enjoy each others company. It is a nice break from the bickering, whining and crying that I seem to hear quite often already!

Tootie decided she wanted to give driving it a try. The bike has a foot pedal rather than a button to push with her finger like her tiny little 4-wheeler does, so she was confused why it wouldn't stop.

Toots also isn't very good at steering...make that she isn't good at steering AT ALL! I had to drop my camera every few seconds (not literally, of course!) and run over to turn her before she hit my van.

She didn't want to be done riding so I got Grant to bring her on a few more laps around the driveway. And then he had a bright idea...

He was making a break for it up the driveway and his little sissy thought it was pretty funny!

And there they go. My two little dumplin's riding off into the sunset...

Until they reached the gravel and Mom stopped them of course!

The funny thing is, when Grant was 2, Duke left on his motorcycle with a friend to go riding. As they were leaving, Grant ran into the garage and hopped onto his cycle and started following them. They were long gone by the time he got about half way up the driveway and I had to coax a very angry two year old back to the house and try to explain to him exactly why he could not hit the open road with the guys quite yet! And I am sure we will be having many more of those discussions in the years to come since it does appear that he has motorcycles in his blood like dear o'le Dad!

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ICE CREAM!

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream!

One way we love to cool off during the summer is by indulging in some ice cream. So far that is one word that Tootie can say loud-n-clear!

Her daddy has a bad habit of devouring his dinner and then his craving for ice cream takes over so presumably without thinking he goes into the freezer and grabs himself some dessert...in front of the kids who have barely begun to eat their dinner. NICE!

I always have to play "bad mama" and tell them they have to finish their dinner before they get their treat. On this particular evening, drumsticks were on the menu. Tootie wasn't quite sure how to get her mouth around the entire thing, especially with all of the hard chocolate and nuts so the inner beaver in her reared it's ugly cute little head!

She was pleased as punch that for once she didn't have to share with me and she actually had what she referred to as "mine own i-cream"

Don't be mistaken...Pokey Pete finally finished his dinner and got to join in on the sugary fun too

He was a little more methodical about how he was going to enjoy his long awaited treat...

Piece by nuttily-delicious piece that is!

What a stinkin' goof ball he is!

Meanwhile, back on the farm little Daisy Duke was still munchin' away!

...and munchin'!

There is nothing better than a good ice cream cone to make a heart {and a little girl} smile!

Now go grab yourself a little treat of your own and take a moment to enjoy some priceless memories with your loved ones! I know I will...my little punk has his "Mr. White" {the name that Grant gave his blankie when he was about 2 and it has just stuck!} and wants a little snuggle time with Mommy.

Tootle-loo!