"Daddy caught a catfish."

About 5 times a day I hear, "Daddy caught a fish. It was tall. It was messy. It was a catfish." After naps I hear about how many fish each person caught... (cause I think Logan is dreaming about fishing already). I hear, "Papa caught 1 fish. Daddy caught 1 fish. Brian caught 2 fish!" All of this is because way back in September, we took Logan to "THE LAND."

We took our minivan off roading through mid missouri to some property of Greg's parents, affectionately known as "The Land."

We went with Grandma and Papa and Brian and Kari for a family day of fun and fishing. It was kind of chilly but Logan and Tyson really enjoyed their time at the land. And we were able to go into the barn when it got cold.

Grandma made chili and hotdogs and Grandpa came up with a very ingenious plan for cooking the dogs.

After lunch we headed down to the lake for boat ridin', fishin' and hanging out.

Logan was so comfortable at the land. In fact, I took the boys up to the barn and while I was putting Tyson down for a nap in his pack-n-play, Logan took off. He walked all the way to the lake (where Greg was waiting) by himself. He was wearing a bell necklace that day and Greg said he looked up and saw Logan, walking down the path, singing 'Jingle Bells' at the top of this lungs!

While we were waiting for everyone to pack up, Logan and I took a wagon ride around the land.

Notice he already has his jammies on. We had 2 very tired boys after a busy day of play at the land.

It's time for a good snowball fight!!

Are you wondering where we found a snowpile in September?

We've been loving this nice fall weather. We also love that we live close to some amazing parks. So the other evening we headed out to the park across from Suson Park- next to the ice rink and the golf course. Ok, if I knew the actual name if it, I'd tell you but I don't.

The boys loved playing together. Both of them like to swing. Since we were the only people at the park, we hung out on the swings for a while. Logan just likes to go higher and higher and higher.

Tyson just likes that he's big enough to get in a swing now!

I'm gonna go ahead and point fingers here: Daddy dressed Logan for the park. He claims he matches. You be the judge...

Logan got to play on the big equipment with the slides and ladders. Tyson got to play on the little kid stuff. He really liked showing off his crawling skills in this tube.

Also, in true Higgins boy fashion, he is already mastering the art of climbing UP the slide. (You other playground moms hate me already!)

Tyson wasn't completely content on the "baby" stuff. He did want to go check out the big boy ladders.

Logan came over and showed him the ropes.

and climbed up some ropes. This is Logan's great accomplishment of the summer. He can now climb this wiggly ladder thing.

We all had fun on the slides together too!

After we played, we found the snowpile in the parking lot next to the ice rink.

And had a snowball fight!

And practiced climbing up mountains of snow.

I love my family!!

9 months old

Tyson is 9 months old today.

He's crawling and pulling up.

He can cruise on the furniture.

He likes to sit on the little stool (with help).

He likes to bang and drop things! Helping me cook is one of his favorite things!

We drag him on a lot of outings with his big brother so he has already been to The Land.

He's been to play at the Transportation Museum.

He's gotten to sit in the big train there.

He's been to play at the playground... and boy does he think he is a big boy there!

He's such a happy baby. When people are around him they always say, "Is he always this happy and contented?" Pretty much. He really only fusses when he is tired, hungry, or when Logan has just pushed his face into the floor or something brotherly like that.
He is also "talking". He loves to say "ma-ma". Seriously, that is his favorite word. Do you know how happy that makes me. I'd love for him to say "Da-da" more for Greg too. He also tries to repeat the word "ball" when I hand him a ball.
He can wave bye-bye. Sometimes he waves to himself, which I love! He also signs "more" and sometimes signs "all done".
He is eating more solid foods: little pieces of banana, chicken, and peas. He also eats baby goldfish, mum-mums, and crackers. I think he has also had a fistful of dirt, leaves, grass, Logan's pretzels... but those were not intentional.
He loves his brother and his daddy. He wants to be right where they are all the time. He loves being one of the guys. Logan loves to boss him around and say, "No, no baby." But when Tyson cries he says, "It's ok baby, it's ok." Tyson is such an important part of our little family and we all love him to pieces!

Powder Valley and Pizza

Greg sister, Pam, and her family came to town last weekend. We met up with them at Powder Valley.  Powder Valley Conservation Area is one of our favorite places to take the boys. It is close to our house. It has a small museum that is geared toward kids. It also has an area to sit and look at deer. They feed the deer and the deer come right up where you can see them. The area to sit and view the deer is very cozy with couches and a fireplace.

They also have lots of stuff for the kids, including two puppet areas,

 a tree house, coloring areas, a book area, animal displays, and a fish aquarium (actually it's an outdoor pond that you can view from underground and inside). They also have an indoor honeybee hive. The bees fly into it through pipes in the walls. It is enclosed in glass and you can view the bees while they work. Here is my honey.

 (I told you I'd put it on the blog!)
After playing in the museum we went on a walk outside. They have several hiking trails and some of them are paved.
We went and ate at Incredible Pizza after our hike. It's a great place to take a family of all boys! They have a pizza buffet, which even our youngest boys enjoyed.

They also have games and kiddie rides. The big boys and the little boys loved the games!

We had a lot of fun hanging out with Grandma and Papa Higgins.

The Bradleys go to Branson

We took our annual trip to Branson- Silver Dollar City in September. We had so much fun in September but I'm about 5 blog posts behind!! Greg, Logan, Tyson, and I rode with Grandma and Grandpa Bradley in the red van. Julie and Ryan, Nick and Alex came down after Ryan got off work on Friday. The boys were very good travelers. See my other blog to see what I packed for them to do in the car. Logan stayed pretty busy on the way there. His favorite activity was the sticker books. He also liked that Grandpa and Grandma packed their portable DVD player so he got to watch an episode of Blues Clues and a home video of himself! That definitely helped when Tyson needed to sleep. We only made one stop for the bathroom and to feed Tyson. Logan kept his pull-up dry all the way until we stopped at the gas station (and then he used the nasty gas station toilets. Should I celebrate that? Gross. And um, why do they have to touch all the parts of the toilet??????)  Ok, back to the trip... we arrived in Branson around 5 pm, unloaded, and went to eat supper. We ate at Pizza World. It was a Pizza buffet and it was really good... or I was really hungry but regardless, I loved it. Logan ate pizza but Tyson just flirted with all the older ladies in the restaurant. (I knew all the old folk in Branson would love my Tyson.)
After dinner we went to the hotel to swim. I have swimming pictures on my camera but I'm having fits with them. Greg?? Help?? Please??? Logan loved swimming.. Tyson- not so much. In fact, he wouldn't even look at anyone who was in the pool because he was terrified someone would make him get in! He ended up sitting out on the side and taking a bottle from Grandma.
The first night there, the boys didn't really sleep much. They kept waking each other up and when we would have let them cry at home, we had to get them up at the hotel. They also woke up at 4:30 am and did not go back to sleep. They were both pretty tired for Saturday. I was kind of bummed about that because I wanted them to have fun at SDC. It worked out ok because they BOTH took naps during the day at SDC.
On Saturday morning we had breakfast at the hotel and then went to Silver Dollar City. At SDC, they  measure the kids and give them a colored wristband which denotes which rides they can ride. Tyson couldn't ride any of the rides-- except the train. But he just enjoyed being with everybody.

Logan could go on the bugs and the butterflies by himself and most of the other rides with an adult. He couldn't ride any of the big people roller coasters except for Fire in the Hole- but I nixed that! None of the rides scared him. He even liked "the fast boats." I rode that one with Alex and I gotta say, it is pretty intense for a kid ride. I was holding on the Alex. I think he thought I was pretty strange. Logan's favorite ride was the frogs. He rode it several times.

Our very nice parents decided it would be fun for Julie and Ryan and Greg and me if we all got a "break time". Julie and Ryan went off by themselves in the morning. I think they went dancing and shopping :) We stayed with all of the boys.

Then Greg and I went off by ourselves in the afternoon.

We went on the cave tour.

It was a hot day and much cooler down there. It's nice to just "escape" and see some natural beauty.

 I couldn't go in the cave last year because I was preggo.
After the cave, we all rode the train. If you've ridden the train at SDC, you know that they have a mock train heist with train robbers. It's the same thing every year- same corny jokes that would only work at a theme park like SDC. However, this time, my nephew Alex decided to spice it up. Alex loves to roar at people. So when the train robbers got really close to Alex, Nick told Alex, "You should roar at them." Alex got right in their face and roared. Alex loves to scare people so when the robber responded with a "He scared me!" (and I think he really did.) Alex was glowing! And the rest of us were laughing hysterically.

Logan was pretty tired by train time but Tyson enjoyed his only ride of the day.

Oh, yeah, Tyson also got to ride in his stroller.

All of the boys did really good. They took turns in the sit and stand stroller. Although, Logan was determined to walk the entire day!! When Nick rode in the stroller, I made Greg push because he is much, much stronger than me!

After SDC, we went to Country Buffet or something like that for dinner. It's a really, really, really yummy buffet. Seriously, I have never had food like that off a buffet. Luckily, Logan was free because I think he ate some shredded cheese and that was it, (Two year olds!) But Tyson loved the honey biscuits. After eating, all the guys played a round of mini golf (the restaurant is attached to an indoor mini golf course).

There was a lady waiting behind us who was obviously frustrated that we had brought kids to golf. I guess she thought Tyson would be holding everybody up because she huffed, "Babies? Golfing? Seriously??" By the way, Tyson did not golf- he just practiced his "walking" on the course and huffy lady picked the other course to play!

The boys slept much better the second night- hallelujah! Sunday morning we had breakfast at the hotel again, loaded up, and headed home. We had difficulty getting out of Branson because the Iron Man competition was in town and they had shut down all kinds of roads for them to compete. But the boys did pretty good on the ride home- despite all the twists and turns we had to make. We stopped at one rest area that had a playground and we tried to stop at Mc Donalds- but when we got off the exit, we saw that the McDonalds had been completely bulldozed over! So we ate at Burger King.
When we got on to Old HWY 21 headed toward our house, Logan said, "I want to go back to Branson." Ugh- no more long drives for now buddy-- but we'll take you back next year because we had  alot of fun too! Thank you to Grandma and Grandpa Bradley for treating us all to a trip to Branson. We love it!!