A Normal Afternoon in 'da Hood

(Also known as "the neighborhood.")

Every week I do the yard work, and at the end I always use the blower... and I ALWAYS have my little ones running around screaming at me to turn it towards them.  They love to see if I can get their shirt up and then they love to watch their skin ripple in the wind!  So funny...

It's actually hard for me to find the right wording for this post without sounding "INAPPROPRIATE!"

But I've actually only captured it on film with Ella.  So sad, 'cause it's really funny with the others, too!

I'll go ahead and admit it now... I laugh JUST AS MUCH as they do during all this fun!!  Maybe more!  And I have to admit... there's a perk in blowing Ella's sound AWAY from me!

And then there's always a good game of baseball going on... if Braeden can help it, anyway! It just so happened that while the Blackburn family was staying with us and they were more than willing to play! So fun... Braeden would play baseball for HOURS on end EVERY DAY if he could, or I guess the better wording here would be IF WE WOULD LET HIM!!

And then... when it's hot outside, and the kids are just itching to play outside with friends... how can one deny them the chance to just be a kid and run through the sprinklers for a while????? It's just so fun(ny)!

Well... or lay in the gutter.  We have a gutter boy here, in case you haven't noticed from pictures past.  Totally nasty, but... what do you do?????  Hopefully he won't make it a long-term lifestyle thing!  ;)

Just call him "gutter-boy".  How can we turn that into a superhero??  Hmmm...

There's nothing quite like listening to these two run through the sprinklers.  The decibel level would be over the limit if we were past the noise ordinance curfew!  Haha!  Vinny and Ella... are VERY LOUD!!  :)  Funny... but LOUD!

The new Baywatch look... :)

Alex stayed in this mud puddle for the majority of the time.  His feet got a nice spa treatment in my front yard!

Seriously?  Eeewwww.  Kids and mud.  Eewwwww!  Good thing I have the sprinklers to help me out with this messy problem!  (Which is more than I can say for other kinds of messy problems that we get into here... ;))

Muddy Gutter Boy... I don't know... Sounding more like a nasty villain now.  Ick.

Ella and Alex rinsing off the mud. 

And then... there's always got to be time for "dress-up!!"  And Ella LOVES it when there's someone willing to do it with her... or at least help her and play along!  

Ella and Audrey... pretty ballerina girls!