Life with 3, no wait, 4 boys...

Is a totally ridiculous circus most of the time really, but we wouldn't have it any other way!!  And Marius is seriously the biggest kid out of them all.

We popped in to visit my mom for her birthday, the day after Christmas, and she was busy moving her old spare room bed out.  The boys were thrilled and made an instant wrestling arena out of the old bed.  When he realised what they were doing, Marius quickly joined in.  I mean, which dad wouldn't enjoy a bit of rough and tough with his kids, right?

 I think he gives in and just lets them shove him around a bit...

 They all take turns squashing him, while they wrestle with one another...

And the boys get pretty intense about it...

 Not to be outdone by Michael, Jake is quick to shove him off, so that he can also have a turn squashing Marius.  I love how confident and comfortable Jake is with Marius and his boys.  It's a good sign and it makes my heart very happy...

 Lol... Jake's not as strong though...

 Marius is under there somewhere... all arms and legs...

 Jake looks quite comfy hanging off the edge of the bed about to fall on his head...

 A few days later and we were celebrating New Year's Eve at Marius' sister, Janine's, house.  We took sushi with for starters.  We actually got to her house really early and had intended to be back at Marius' house before the clock struck 12, so that we could watch the fireworks from the beach, but we landed up staying late.  Jake and Michael have become real sushi pigs, so we got them each their own little platter, so they'd leave the grown ups food alone.

Jake's favourite sushi is Salmon Roses.  Please don't look at Jake's chin - I still feel awful about it!  He'd been on anti-biotics for 4 days already here and it was already looking better...

 

 Michael's choice is always California Rolls...

 Cam doesn't like fish at all and so he had chicken instead.  That's not his beer, by the way...

 Michael and Cameron spent lots of time in the pool with Marius...

 Cam's turn...

 These are Marius' sister's dogs, Georgia and Duke.  She's often home alone and their grounds are huge, so the dogs are fantastic protection for her...

 Michael having lots of fun...

 And to prove it again, Marius really is just an overgrown kid...

 Jake didn't feel like swimming... he gets a little shy sometimes.  He so badly wanted to play with the dogs, but the last time the boys were with them, they climbed into Janine's spaniel.  They're big animals and I think both Marius and I feel happier having them a little further away from our boys faces...

 Cam's like a little bean pole at the moment.  He's eating everything in sight.  The boys mom has hired them a personal trainer, so they are exercising at home every evening - it's very cute...

 All fun and games...  I love these calm summer evenings!

  There was plenty of jacking around for the camera and I have a few shots where costumes have slipped, or creeped, that I'll save you from seeing here, but that'll make awesome pics for 21st birthdays...

 Michael can't understand why Marius can't throw him as high as Cam goes... just not possible - he's a lot bigger than both Jake and Cam...

 Jake sat with me and we managed to get this pretty good selfie of ourselves... 

So, on that note... I hope that 2015 will be a fantastic year for you all.  I hope that it will be a year of dreams coming true, full of love and laughter and special memories made with your nearest and dearest.

Love

Sue XXX

Christmas Day...

The boys were up early on Christmas morning, to try get a quick body board in before heading off for our family lunch.  Jake was super, SUPER excited to get his new suit on and try it out!

The three boys waiting for us outside.  Not sure what Michael & Jake were disagreeing on here, but Jake doesn't look very impressed with Michael.  It's funny, the three of them get on so well.  Naturally, they do have their disagreements and Jake and Michael are particularly similar.  Jake has a tendency to overreacts and Michael likes to tease him to get the reaction.  Jake rises every time.  Cameron's the more laid back one, who just listens and laughs at the other two being silly.  He's ridiculously funny.  The most important thing for me though, is that they're always excited to see each other on a Friday and they're sad to say goodbye on a Sunday afternoon.  It's all good life lessons, especially for Jake, who's totally over-indulged all the time...

 All "my" boys heading down to the beach...

 I need to print one of these, I love them...

 

 Jake flying his board like a kite.  The weather was pretty grim on Christmas, but it couldn't keep the kids out of the water.  It was actually stunning on the beach, nice and quiet...

 Putting on the new flippers he got from his granny & grandpa...

 One last look at me over his shoulder (total bedhead going on there)...

 And off he goes.  Hahaha... look how dirty his bum got from sitting in the wet sand.  Black next time...

 Cam didn't even slow down, let alone look back.  Jake was already in the water and it was too much to bear...

 Michael decided to stay on the beach and play catch with his dad instead...

 Which left me alone with the gulls...

 It wasn't long though before he grabbed his board and headed for the water too...

 The boys all grew their hair in the holidays, it was fun...

 Over at Nini and Pa's house, it was great excitement as the kids got stuck into unwrapping their presents.  Corky was thrilled with his star wars Lego - he's very into Lego at the moment and all his constructions are left in tact on every open surface in his bedroom.  Not sure how Jo manages, but it looks AWESOME...

 It was Rylee's first Christmas too.  He was pretty into the present unwrapping too...

 Mmmm... wonder what's in here...

 Bi is into all things girly - she loves Peppa Pig, Polly Pocket, Barbie, Princess Sofia - the list goes on.  It's fun buying for a little girl for a change...

 And look at her pretty Christmas dress...

 Ag man!  Rylee was actually just into the paper.  We bought him an awesome pool, with toys to go in it...

 Jake took on a far more sedated attitude towards opening his presents this year.  Sob, my baby is growing up far too quickly at the moment!  Somebody press pause, please...

 We'd really struggled with Jake's skin and it'd just start looking OK and then get worse.  It was OK on Christmas, but by Boxing Day, it looked dreadful.  And by the time we eventually got to the doctor on the 27th, it was even worse...

 Our pretty Christmas table with our home made crackers...

 Jake's sunflower was the centerpiece...

 We all did a bit to help out - here's Jo whipping up one of her fantastic gourmet salads...

 Our feast - a mixture of hot and cold, salads and veggies.  It was as divine as it looked.  Pudding was just as amazing and I'm only just beginning to feel hungry again...

That last part was a joke.  I'm always hungry!

Sending love,

Sue XXX

Lazy summer days...

 The holidays have come and gone and it's back to school and the usual hum-drum of every day life.  The holidays passed by surprisingly quickly for us.  Some moms have been thrilled at the idea of getting kids back to school and routines, while Jake & I could definitely have done with another few weeks off.  Our holiday was lazy and relaxing and just about perfect in every way - we ate too much and slept even more.  Jake had a break from his meds and it's been nice to see him enjoying food so much.  He even put on a little weight!

Jake got off to a good start yesterday - he is with the teacher he'd hoped to be placed with and had a great first day back.  The real work kicks in from today though, they'll be starting to tackle work and I'm sure he'll be full of grumbles when I fetch him later.  Homework sucks, to put it bluntly.  I know it's a fact of life and I guess all the hard work in the term makes the holidays all the more enjoyable, but still...  We are already looking forward to the Easter break!

Jake and I didn't actually spend too much time at home this holiday.  My cousin moved in to our house for a few days and we took advantage and moved temporarily into our beach house with Marius and his boys.  It was fantastic, but more about that later.

Jake's veggie patch was doing super well until we moved out.  Marius had helped us put up a shade cloth and it was all looking so promising...  Jake had the promise of butternuts and patty pans and more tomatoes than we'd know what to do with, but unfortunately, the wind has been awful until now and I don't think the plants were watered as much as they'd have liked.  Before we "moved out", Jake's first sunflower opened.  He was thrilled - we all love sunflowers and they hold special meaning to us because the ward my dad had his transplant done in, is called the Sunflower Ward.  There's obviously also the Sunflower Fund, which raises money for the bone marrow registry.  Jake decided that his first flower was for his Pa...

 Look at our gorgeous veggie patch and green garden!  A lot of the plants have come to their end now and the garden is coming up for a good clear out.  We have 5 baby watermelons still growing nicely, so the clear out has to wait a bit...

 Also before Christmas, I managed to take some new photos of Rylee for Rosie's gift.  She had been wanting some updated photos of him to put up and so it was the perfect gift.  He's such a little character though, with such cute facial expressions!  His hair has a definite auburn tinge and he's very mobile these days, crawling around all over the show.  He's also got a couple of teeth...

 Nini is so silly... 

 Huh?

 Eating leaves is funny business...

 This is one of the ones I printed for Rosie...

 I think this might've been the only picture where he actually looked at me...

 A serious moment...

 Auntie Sue... did you know how irritating you really are??

 Help me Nini... Please....

 WHAT??!  This stocking is empty!!

 We spent Christmas Eve with Marius' family.  Christmas takes on a whole different meaning when the kids aren't all that excited about waking up to open presents.  They actually opted to open their presents on Christmas Eve, something I've never done before and which felt very weird for me.  Makes Christmas morning a little flat.  Marius' sister, her boys and Marius' mom joined us.Trying to get our three to behave properly for a photo is just about impossible though - they're ridiculous...

 Nice try...

 The boys, especially Cameron, were thrilled to find a can of whipped cream for each of them under the tree.  This photo of Cameron cracks me up every time I look at it...

 And Jake tried to get as much in as he possibly could.  Poor Jake developed impetigo during the holidays too.  Disgusting, I know, but it is what it is.  It means that he didn't really want to be in any photos and my holiday photos are surprisingly few.  You can see it in the pic below - it started as a little pimple, that he scratched, obviously getting the bacteria into his blood and then it popped up in every open sore he had.  With the holidays, it got quite out of hand before we got a doctor's appointment and he needed 2 courses of antibiotics to clear it all up.  He's better now and there's thankfully no scarring...

YAY!  It's good to be back!  Promise to post more photos soon.  Hope you all had a great festive season - what did you do???  Wish you a happy 2015!

Love,

Sue XXX