HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRAYSON, GRAY!

It's hard to believe our little man is 3! (Actually, if you ask him, "My 5). Time really does fly. We had a crazy weekend filled w/Ranger graduations, soccer parties and trips. Happily, Gray was convinced it was all in his honor.

Grayson:
You are a joy to have in our family. You love to laugh, you love to play basketball, you love to find treats. Basically, you LOVE life and will find any reason to laugh. We love you!

Camping

Friday night my boys hit a milestone that will make all the Peterson men proud. They are now officially campers. They both made it through a chilly night with their Daddy snuggled in sleeping bags and warmed by a ROARING fire.

Just a few pics and words to recapture the night: Machetes, tunnel trolls, acorn throwing squirrels, marshmellow sandwiches(aka smores), scary stories and happy, happy boys.

The tunnel

G and S. The littlest and most cheerful campers.

The pyrotechs
The audience

The supplies
A big thank you to the Partridges who so generously donated their yard and wilderness for an unforgetable evening. And an even bigger thank you to Reed and all the other Dads who responded so willingly to the 4pm call of "you're going camping in 2 hours".

Happy Halloween!

We had a fantastic Halloween with a weeks worth of activities that culminated with treat or treating in the rain. Luckily, clones are tough.

Matts broke my poor, overacheiving heart when he declared that not only did he want to be Captain Rex, he wanted Captain Rex from Walmart. He wouldn't even let me embellish with a belt, blaster, shoe-covers; NOTHING. Put that down as #111 of things I swore I wouldn't let my kiddos do. Happily, Halloween worked it's magic and In Matts' 6 year-old mind that white, silky jumpsuit transformed him into a battle hardened clone captain.

Gray, of course, had to follow in Matts' footsteps and was Commander Cody. For our little treat monger the magic of Halloween is people handing out candy with no strings attached. After a night of trick or treating Gray walked in and shrieked "I got Candy!!!" at the top of his lungs in complete disbelief.

All the very best

The boys had a fantastic weekend filled with their favorite things; Grandma Diane, soccer, army, Aunt Hayley, Rambo and did we mention Grandma Diane? After a relaxing weekend in Atlanta, interrupted briefly for a freezing game of soccer, Grandma headed down to Columbus w/Hayley for a few days. On Wednesday I packed up two very happy boys to meet Grandma and Hayley on base. We hit up the Nat'l infantry museum, ate at the PX and rough-housed w/Rambo.

This is how we play soccer here in the ATL

The "wingmen" after Mckay's first goal

Does life get any better?

Ahoy Matey!

Last, but not least, while we were at the beach pirates came ashore. Luckily, Q had left a very polite note and instead of slitting our throats in the night they left us treasure.

Mexico Beach

After I finished the race we took the week off. And I do mean off. No work, no school, limited phone/internet, no restaurants; just the fabulous beach, good friends and entirely too much food.

Trek to the Tri, Part II

Just when you think you know what to expect, life throws you a curve. In all our planning, scheming, talking and training we NEVER talked about rain/wind/miserable storms in our sunny, Mexico Beach, race planning. Consider us schooled.

Trek to the Tri #2 ended in the pouring rain. It was freezing for the swim (the racers huddled in the ocean water pre-start), let up for the bike (thank heaven) and was just plain sloshy for the run. On the plus side, we all pulled through quite respectably (placing 1st or 2nd in our divisions) and I felt great post-race. I guess it's a testiment to the pure awesomeness of my training partners, and our matching paisley tanks, that I'm already planning on next year.