You thought I was kidding about how much I love my bike?

Hot days, cool ride.

Cool fun, cute little brother.



He may just look a little like his momma

A Few more of our favorite books

Momma wakes up every morning to the mantra, "Let's read a book! Read me this book!" So every morning we start our day reading books for 20 minutes or so. It's as though Tyson and I aren't adjusted to begin the day without a few stories - but this works out well because then we're always assured of reading time.

A few of our current favorite reads:

Millions of Cats - Wanda Gag - written in 1928 - that's when you know it's a classic, if it's been around that long and still on recommended reading lists

Curious George Goes to the Hospital - H.A. Rey - Cole loves the whole series, but this book has been a particular favorite...he quotes it to himself while playing with his trucks.

The Snowman - Raymond Briggs - Cole's fascination with wordless books continues. At least 8 out of his favorite 10 books are wordless - he loves stories told through illustrations.

Tremendous Tractors - Tony Mitton - there's a bunch of books in this series by this author - they love machines and love knowing all the names - Tyson really likes this one too.

Annie and the Wild Animals - Jan Brett - Cole has asked me several times since this one has gone back to the library if we can get it again.

The "Carl" series - Alexandra Day - wordless, both boys love these books.

Peter Spier's Rain - wordless, both boys love it - they also love Peter Spier's Circus and Peter Spier's Christmas - maybe I'm just a good illustration explainer and that's why they're so fascinated with wordless books :).

The "Frog" series by Mercer Mayer - wordless - I can't count how many times I've "read" "Frog, where are you?" this round of library books. It's the first one on Cole's stack every day!

Tyson continues to love all Nancy Tafuri books, and we stumbled on the "Amy" series by Julia Hoban that he loves as well.

"One Morning in Maine" - Robert McCloskey - the man's a genius. "Blueberrys for Sal" is one of my favorites from childhood too.

Summertime and the living is easy

Tyson hauled out his Mississippi State hat one day and got it on his head all by himself. A funny little Tyson story: Cole and Tyson were playing on our bed one Saturday morning while we were lounging around. Cole jumped on the bed (an automatic spanking here) and got a spank. Tyson, the little stinker, lays on his stomach, reaches his chubby little arm around and starts spanking himself on his bottom, smiling all the while!

Another Tyson funny: He confuses words sometimes in the cutest ways. They both love having something shaken on their food, and since we don't put a lot of salt on their vegetables, they always ask for pepper. But before Tyson knew what a prize pepper was, I shook some on his corn one night. He looks at me on the verge of tears and bawls, "But I don't like PEPPERONI!"

My kids have never really liked watching tv. I know what you're thinking, that I've poisoned their minds. I can assure you that I've never even made a negative comment about them watching tv...I've never had to, they won't watch it!! I thought this was just a fluke with Cole, that he loves books and just doesn't have any interest in watching more than 5 minutes of tv before going off and playing with something else. But Tyson is the same way. Even at 4 years old the only things Cole will watch are America's Funniest Videos and live animal shows like Jack Hanna's Animal Adventures or something like that. Cartoons hold zero interest for him, and even Sesame Street is a 5-minuter. One afternoon it was rainy and they asked to watch tv so I put on a Winnie the Pooh video. I pick up VHS tapes for 25 cents at garage sales to see if I can hit on anything they'll watch (let's face it, sometimes it's just nice to have a few minutes of peace on a rainy day), and below you can see what happened. They watched for about 5 minutes, then got playdoh out and ignored the tv on in the background while they talked with each other about what they were making.

They are both terrified of swinging as well, another universal love of children. I don't know what we do to them, but whatever it is has instilled a fear of swinging and disinterest in cartoons. Guess we'll have to stick to playdoh and reading books :)

Free food - you know that's my momma's style!

Although free food is definitely up my momma's ally, dressing up is not. So when Chick-Fil-A Day came around, she had no intention at all of us participating even though we all could eat free. But Miss Helen was our saving grace, and she tipped Momma over the edge just an hour and a half before lunch time. So out came the construction paper and safety pins. Tyson's shirt says "I love cows", mine says "Cows Rock", and note that Momma has cow ears taped to a headband on her own head. Now that you know that my mother doesn't like dressing up, it will make sense that Tyson and I don't like it either, and it took a good bit of convincing to get us to wear these clothes with spots pinned onto them. But we do love "Chick-Fa-LEG" as Tyson calls it, so it was worth it. 

Let the feeding frenzy begin. 

One of the disadvantages of being a little guy is that you get taken advantage of. Momma stapled a tail to the tag in Tyson's pants. In all fairness she wasn't sure how well dressed we had to be so she gave herself a tail too. But she knew the spots were already pushing me to the brink, so no tail for me. 

Riding with the big boys now!

This post may better be named, "The day I got a brand new bike...emphasis on BRAND NEW in case we look back on our childhood and think we only got stuff from garage sales". I've been wanting a bike for months, and I even went so far as to begin asking for specifics like, "I want my bike to be orange and blue." Well hot dog, can you believe I am here riding an ORANGE AND BLUE bike!?? No, pigs aren't flying. Mom and Dad decided to get me my birthday present early. Momma had been looking for a bike for me for months at garage and consignment sales to no avail, and they decided to spring for it and get me a new one - and they even found one in the colors I wanted!!!

This is me - proud as a peacock. And that little guy in the background? That's Tyson - heartbroken. Soon after this picture he went over and knelt down in the gutter and laid his head on the sidewalk, he was so distraught that he didn't have a bike too.

I'm not cold-hearted, though, so I let the little guy have some turns on my new ride. I got this 2 months ago, and every time we have someone over to the house for dinner I haul my bike into the living room and show it to them. I love it so much.



The advent of chores in the Dent household

One of Momma's big passions in parenting is raising independent, hard-working adults. So we have been introduced to chores. Not because we make it easier for Momma. Be assured it would be MUCH easier and MUCH faster if she did them herself, but she tries hard to give us jobs and make sure we do them so we learn early on that life takes work...she says our wives will thank us one day...she also says we're not coming back to live here when we're adults...i'll just take her word for it that sorting the clean silverware into the drawer will translate into me living on my own one day. So here I am helping with a chore that Tyson and I fight over - laundry helper. See that white step-ladder in front of the washer? It's basically the throne of the laundry room, and when Momma yells, "Time to do laundry!" Tyson and I go flying to the laundry room to see who can claim the throne first. We help Momma put the dirty laundry into the machine, then here I am getting it from the washer to put in the dryer. But I'm just a little guy, and I was in here so long that momma peeked around the corner to see what I was doing only to find me head to toe INSIDE the washer getting the socks at the bottom that I couldn't reach any other way.

Our other chores at this point (Tyson at 2 and Cole at almost 4) are: Cole empties Tyson's trash can every couple days, when the dishwasher is clean Tyson unloads all the silverware into the drawer and Cole sorts it into all the right compartments, then they both help unload the tupperware and plastic plates and cups. Cole takes his laundry to the hamper every day or two, and they both like to sweep....maybe that one should be in quotes like "sweep" :). 



Picnic on the Path

I've given up my nap most days now (cry a tear for my mother), so one day Momma decided that while Tyson napped we would have a picnic on the bench on the walking trail behind our house. We took some books and I ate my lunch while Momma read to me. We had such a cozy time :)



The greatest show on earth!

In June Momma took me to see the Barnum & Bailey Bash at the coliseum downtown. It was pricey so we left Daddy and Tyson at home. Now if you know anything about the circus, it's kinda like the fair. Everything is astronomically expensive, but it's timed just right so you have to get there at 5:00 - right when you're hungry. But nobody fools my momma and if you know her, she will not be paying you $7 for a hotdog. So we got there a few minutes early and ate sandwiches and grapes in the car before we went in and watched the rest of the crowd spend a week's salary on food. But don't feel too sorry for me, she's not so bad after all.

See? She asked me what treat I wanted to get, and I saw these Smore's on a Stick and that was the ticket. So she forked over $5 which was actually the cheapest snack you could get - lucky for her...maybe I'm hardwired for frugality too. 

While we were a little disappointed that there were no lions or zebras or trick riders or tight-rope walkers (I know, I said we were at the circus but apparently Mississippi gets the B circus), we DID get to see elephants and dogs and camels and all in all we had a great time. Momma spent a good deal of time adding up what she thought the average family was spending on admission, food, and souvenirs based on what she observed, but once she got past $175 she gave up.  I'm just glad I got a treat out of her!

Cozying up the joint

My summer project was to cozy up our house. We have 10-foot ceilings in our living/dining/kitchen area and I'm not gifted in the decorating area. But after almost 2 years of living here, it was really feeling cold and empty, especially at night with no light other than the the lights 10 feet above you. This is the dining room part of it before (first 2 pics) and after (2nd 2 pics).

I got the dresser below at a consignment shop and had someone paint it with chalk paint, use a dark wax on it, and distress it a little bit. I LOVE how it turned out. The lamps are also from the same consignment shop, the platter was from a friend who was cleaning out before moving, the lantern from a garage sale, the picture is of me holding Tyson as a newborn with dried rose petals from Thomas and my wedding in a wine glass beside it. The pictures are of Thomas and my families back 4 or 5 generations with the verse "We will tell the next generation the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord, his power, and the wonders he has done."



I spray painted the chandelier (never again but it looks great) and a friend made the curtains. All in all, I absolutely love how everything turned out. It does make a huge difference to have some stuff on the walls and curtains on the windows.