Khloe is 3!

We didn't have a cake for Khloe until 2 days after her birthday. She had a cake at her house on her birthday and we went to lunch but we didn't have a chance to have dinner until Thursday.  She was so cute she kept trying to share with Sean. "This is Sean's". No sweetie it's all for you. As much as Sean wants to share your 12 inch Minnie Mouse bike it really is all yours. She is an expert candle blower outer. AJ accidentally put trick candles on her cake at home. 

Helping to put her bike together.

Now she just has to learn to peddle and steer.

Wisteria

Mom obsessed over this wisteria for years! She would stand at the window in the dining room and tell me how I needed to cut it back and wrap it around the post. I would just roll my eyes at her so she would call Carter and Peter to do her wisteria bidding. Year after year she watched that plant and it never bloomed. A couple of weeks I looked at it and I said, "wisteria if you bloom this year I'm going to be pissed." Of course it bloomed. Really, it couldn't bloom last year. By next year the wisteria will probably be growing over the roof.

Spring Soccer

The first week of soccer was cold and rainy. Miserable cold. The second game the weather was nice. The third week it was a little cool and windy but not too bad. While we were setting up our chairs a little soccer player in the field next to us told his coach he had to go to the bathroom. The coach said "go over there." The little boy walked to the side and took his pants completely off. For a minute I thought he was going to poop. It was the funniest thing. He then put his underwear back on then took them off again and peed some more. Kids are so darn funny.

Sean was so hyper on the field. He was hopping around and yelling. I was glad he was on the field, it's a great place to burn off energy.

Watching the little boy pee in the grass made me think of Sean and Ethan when they started playing soccer. They were so cute and little.

Sean and his big hair!

Everything is camo this year, including the soccer uniforms.

Bee Swarm

That mass is 100% bees.

A swarm of bees descended on our front yard. We were sitting outside when they arrived. I had convinced Khloe who is terrified of everything that crawls or flies that it was OK to go outside. Then the yard started buzzing. I ran inside with Khloe and Don stayed outside convincing Polly that she needed to come inside. Sean was playing with his friends, Andrew and Ethan and they were not scared of the buzzing. One of the twins actually threw a stick at the swarm in the the tree. 

 . Lucky for us Sean had some friends over to play and their mom came to pick them up as Don was asking Google what to do. Angela said "my neighbor keeps bees." She called her neighbor who called another person who came and captured our bees. 

The beekeeper said he thought there were over 10,000 bees in the tree. 

No one got stung. The bees were nice, the mosquitoes not so much. The bee keepers said someone had just bought a hive and the bees took off or a colony got too big and split off. They also said the bee's would have moved on in the morning. They were looking for an attic or a tree to live in. When Angela's neighbor called the bee keeper he was in his garage building 5 new bee boxes when he got the call. Now he only needs bees for 4.

They left the box sitting in the yard until after dark so all the bee's could go inside. 

Khloe sat outside a good distance from the bees and watched the show,

The next morning this was all that was left of the swarm.

Best big sister ever!

I drove Khloe and Fanny back to the hospital Thursday morning. Khloe hadn't had a chance to hold the baby. Once she got the baby she wouldn't let anyone else touch her. In this picture she's trying to take Steph's hand off the baby. She is a very protective big sister.

Once she had the boppie under her she could hold her sister without any of us pesky adults trying to help. She didn't want to let me or Fanny hold her. I had Khloe in the chair with me and she was holding Valentina. When Val started to cry Khloe was like "ahh, someone take her!"

I love this picture! Sweetest sisters every.

AJ and his little girls.

I took Khloe back to her house to let the dogs out while AJ and Steph and Fanny stayed at the hospital. They had to wait until 24 hours after the delivery to be discharged. Khloe kept getting in the fridge looking for something to eat. She looked like a little teenager. She ate some yogurt but she didn't like the chunks in it. She tried out a few other things that she wasn't into. Silly little girl.

Happy Birthday Claire Valentina

Steph got induced on April 20th. They got to the hospital at 9 and Val made her entrance sometime after 5. And what an entrance she made. She was born in a wave. A couple of hours before she was born she was having some decelerations with contractions so they did an amnioinfusion. This made Val happy and she quit having decels with contractions. It also put a lot of extra water up above her. When Steph was pushing she started having decels again. This was news to all of us because none of us were looking at the monitor we were looking at Steph. The doctor very calmly said "Steph the baby's not liking this and her heart rate is dropping. Your skin is really tight, is it OK if I cut you?" Steph said "yes." AJ and I both looked over at the monitor and as soon as the doctor gave her the episiotomy the baby flew out in a huge wave of water. 

Khloe was amazing! Before Steph started to push Khloe got bored. She took her little mini mouse suitcase and said "come on mama, come on papa, come on Tita, vamos." Once it was time for the baby to be born Khloe was totally into it. Steph didn't want her watching from below so I had her up at the head of the bed. There was a mirror on the ceiling and Khloe watched the mirror the entire time. AJ and Steph had shown her some deliveries on youtube. Khloe said "Mom goes AHHHHH (and she shakes both her little hands) and then the baby comes out the bum." She looked over at Steph's face and touched her cheek. She was a little surprised because her mom didn't say "AHHHH." As soon as the baby was in Steph's arms she kept saying, "baby, baby, baby." She was so dang cute. She even watched the mirror during the placenta delivery. I think she's a future obstetrician. She was totally into it.

Claire Valentina Cramer 7 pounds 5 ounces. She has hair!

That's a remodel wrap!

The outside looked bad but now the house is painted!

The door is installed.

The poorly installed fence repaired.

The sprinkler guy said he would be done with the sprinklers in a couple of days.
We got a deposit and the new renters move in on May 1st. The old renter texted me yesterday mad that she got a bill from us. She said "I guess I'll see you in court." Ha, I guess she'll see our collection agency in court. What an idiot. She moved out didn't pay her rent for 2 months, didn't pay the gas for 4 months and she's mad at us. I think about those idiots and I want to take out a billboard telling the world what idiots they are.

Happy Birthday Carter

Carter turned 33. We went out to dinner and then had cake and ice cream. I got him new carpet for his birthday. I had no idea how truly awful his carpet was until I went over while the carpet guy was there Sadie had been peeing on the carpet for a longgg time. I'd noticed that Carter's clothes smelled bad when he brought them over to wash them but I didn't realize that his entire house stunk. It took my breath away. So awful! I had given him a weird litter box for Christmas a couple of years ago and it would appear Sadie didn't like it. I bought a new regular litter box and Carter says she's using it now. His clothes didn't smell when he washed them last week.

Sean's art work.

Sean had his first soccer game of the season last Wed. It was really cold and rainy and Sean had asthma. It was miserable and we left at half time.

Khloe saw Johnny the clown at IHOP and he made her a butterfly balloon.

Trial Run

We had a trial run for Valentina's delivery last week. Steph was contracting so Khloe came and spent the night while they went to the hospital. Khloe did really well but at 4 a.m. she woke up crying 

"ba ba". I went downstairs and found a ba ba and brought it upstairs. When I handed it to her she got really mad and yelled "NO BA BA, PA PA!" Oh well, I tried. I told her pa pa would be back in the morning so she went back to sleep. 

In the morning Sean had soccer practice so Khloe played in the park.

In the afternoon she helped Grandpa clean the closet doors for 512. She was a busy girl.

Trying to do Maple Days

Freezing their little butts off!

On our final day in Frostburg we tried to go the Maple day festival. It was way too cold and way too windy. Char was sick and stayed in the car. We ended up eating at a cute little diner and then heading to Pittsburgh to spend the night in a hotel near the airport.

Pancakes with ice cream and maple syrup.