memorial day weekend...

our memorial day weekend was pretty packed full of activity but managed to still be quite relaxing.


friday started off with max, grama and i taking a trip to the outlet mall in oshkosh. 


saturday night we enjoyed a family movie night. 
the movie choice was "a bug's life."


sunday morning i made some smoothies...green monster smoothies none the less.
now, i know it doesn't appear green...but it is made with lots of healthy stuff, including fresh spinach!


max gave them a "thumbs up!"

on sunday, max and i headed up to door county to spend the day with the stachowiaks and grama.
we did some playing, some eating, and some shopping...not a bad day if i say so!


i found this really cute refurbished table for my sister-in-law, amie!

after shopping we spent some time by the water.
it was a bit chilly, so max and i shared a sweatshirt.
please forgive me...my legs haven't seen much sun! :)

on monday morning we headed to neenah for the memorial day parade.

dada with his coffee and max with a lollipop!
it was a holiday, i figured, why not!?!



he loved standing a clapping for the soldiers. 
he even saluted a few of them.
i might have cried a little.


checking out one of the bands as they marched by.

then we headed home to prep for a cookout and have some fun!

we got out the water table.  max LOVED playing in it.
and seriously people, does he not look GIGANTIC in this picture. 
and when did my child get muscles?

this made me nervous but he thought he was big stuff.


then the splashing began.  he got soaked.


goofball!

we had some friends over for dinner.
it was crazy with two almost three year olds and a just over one year old.
i didn't take any pictures but we sure had fun.
i just managed to get one of drew and i enjoying tiny miller lites! :)

thank you to all the service men and women past, present and future.
we are lucky that these people choose to fight for our freedoms.

milwaukee zoo...

on sunday we headed to the milwaukee zoo to celebrate "mother's day" with grammi!
the whole crew was there...grammi, grampa ken, amie, austin, tabby and taygen.


max was very interested in the sharks in this tank.
(i love this picture of him!)


we looked at jellyfish.


they checked out some fish...all from wisconsin.
i'm sure drew used this as a "teaching moment"
you can take drew out of the classroom...but you can't take the classroom out of our drew! :)

i thought the colors of these snakes were incredible!

we brought the wagon...i think he pulled it more than he sat in it.
but after the detroit zoo, when he decided he was tired when we were on the far end of the zoo...

i'm glad we had it when we needed it!

grampa ken was pretty excited to take max on a pony ride.

look at that smile.  he loved it!

such a big boy!

there were a couple of peacocks that were battling with each other.
one would squawk really loud and then show his feathers...they just went back and forth.

it was pretty hilarious.

beautiful elephant!

max and his grammi!

after the zoo, we headed over to see grammi and grampa ken's new place and have a late lunch.

max and "baby taygen" had some snuggle time on grammi's bed!


and within minutes...both my boys were out.
(i'll spare you the picture of drew sleeping...i don't think he'd appreciate me posting it!)

saturday night...

we decided to have a campfire on saturday night.
max was pretty hilarious.

he was riding his picnic table like a horse.

then he took a nap on his horse.

and we ended it all with a "marshmallow on a stick."

just a max and momma day...

i consider myself very lucky for a lot of reasons.
one of them being my job.  i LOVE the work that i do.
i love feeling like i am making a positive difference.
and i also love my schedule.
i work long days on wednesdays and a few other extra things throughout the month.
those extra hours allow me to have fridays off.
we call them "max and momma days."
sometimes they consist of hanging out in our pajamas until the afternoon.
sometimes we do something fun.  sometimes we just play!

well this past friday we started by cleaning.
max wanted to sweep the porch.
who am i to say "no" to my child! :)

we had a few errands to run and i am making an effort to be more active.
so we decided to take the bike!
we did about 6 1/4 miles...and i was pulling 45 pounds!

we stopped at grama's, visited daddy at school, and then rode back home!
it was a pretty fun morning!
another max and momma day in the books!

mothers day...

we started off mother's day with church.

                                                i'm so thankful to be this little guy's mommy!

after church we made a stop at the cemetery to say happy mother's day to my grama.

i miss her so very much.  we brought her a rose from church.

we headed home and packed a picnic.  we loaded up on our bikes and went to the park.

we had a nice picnic and some serious play time on the playground!

my boys treated me with beautiful flowers and a starbucks card!

i'm a lucky lady!

t-rats and sugar...

i won tickets to a t-ratts game!

becky was baby and husband free for the night so we invited her to join us.

friday night rolled around and we were all excited to go!

drew and becky decided that max needed to try cotton candy for the first time.

i don't think he really liked it.  he ended up feeding most of it to his da.

                                            i love this girl!  i'm so lucky to have a friend like her!

                                                 next it was time for some family shots...
                                                                            really, mr. max?

                                                   this one was better...with our little cheeseball!

we got a thumbs up from our little baseball fan!
 he sat/stood in by his seat for the whole game.

               he had a blast.  dancing to the music, cheering for the players, and enjoying LOTS of sugar!

   he tried cotton candy, had a pretzel, and a sprite. YIKES!

 then the little boys behind us were celebrating a birthday and offered max a piece of cake.

   and that is when the crazies set in...

 we had an awesome time and can't wait to go back for another game!!!

tyrone wells...

i bought tickets for this show back in march for drew's birthday gift.
drew discovered tyrone from one of his students.
since that point we have really enjoyed listening to his music.


the show was at shank hall in milwaukee.
it's a very small venue and we enjoyed being so close to the stage.
the opening act was a guy named joe brooks from england. 

he was really good.

then the main act took the stage.
what a great show. 
we even got to meet him afterwards!

drew even bought a cd for his student that first showed him tyrone's music.
what a great night!
happy (belated) birthday to my wonderful husband!

a day to recover...

i took thursday off because i knew i'd be in no shape to go to work after max's sleep study.

on our way home, we stopped at cracker barrel to have breakfast with grammi.

to our surprise, grampa ken joined us too!

max located this eagle right away.

anybody surprised?  

while we were waiting for grammi to arrive, max tried on some hats! :)

could he be more precious?

after a delicious breakfast (sorry i didn't get any pics), we headed home.

it was a beautiful day so we spent most of it outside playing and relaxing.