The Mile Boys

Moving Party!!!

2009-02-18T21:44:00.002-05:00

The blog is moving to another site.
Please visit Four Miles, our new blog.

Halloween Video

2008-11-18T21:22:00.003-05:00

We've had a few weeks to recover from Halloween, but that hasn't helped get the blog updated. Here's the video of Colin dancing in his costume to amuse you until I can manage to post the other pictures.

Massive Fallout 2008

2008-10-11T18:13:00.001-04:00

We couldn't have asked for better weather for the MMBA's second annual Massive Fallout ride. We take as big as a group as we can gather to ride four of the area's mountain bike trails, all conveniently connected by rail-trails and rural dirt roads. Leaving from Stoney Creek Metro-Park at around 10am with gorgeous weather and blue skies.

I was out for a "casual stroll" for the day, trying to cover as many mile as possible, but not worrying about the time it took. Hence, I brought the camera to capture the moments. The trees on Sheldon Road were justing starting to turn colors and the sun was shining on us.

Stopping for a the traffic light, we noticed a house decorated for halloween. They had a big cat peeking out one window, and this, a mummy looking out another.

On our way up the Paint Creek Trail, we stopped shortly, and were passed by a bigger group of riders. Here we are hanging out with biking friends Kristi and Erik.

The day continued to look even prettier as we made our way through Bald Mountain. The ride was wonderful despite a few "minor" incidents (read "Katie fell...hard"). Here's pics of Erick on the trail and the view of a lake.

Once we made our way to Addison, we hung out for a little and got lunch...yum...Brats and Chili. (Yes, that is definitely mountain biking food.)
Addison has always been one of my favorite trails in the area. I but found it especially pretty on this October with the sun shining through the trees.

Rewind!

2008-05-07T12:36:00.008-04:00

Whoa! What has happened to the time?

Everyone is acutely aware that I am notoriously bad at keeping this blog updated. But, I swear...the last few months have just flown by. Busy at work, busy at home.

So, for my sake, I'm going to take a trip down memory lane and do a quick review of the past few months. (Probably short on text, heavy on pictures cause a picture says a 1000 words. Right? That must mean I don't need to.)

Winter Wonderland

Shortly after Christmas we went up north. Weather was great. We had 5" dumped on us the day after we arrived.

Growing Up to Fill Dad's Shoes

Looks like we might need to wait a little longer to try to fill these shoes.

Clean Kids = Goofy Kids

Easter Surprise

We went to an Easter Egg Hunt up-north put on by the Lion's club and surprise! Colin won a new bike. He's still too small to fit on it, but he sure was excited.

I can't hear you mom. I have ketchup in my ears.

Another great instance of a picture being worth a 1000 words. Obviously Aaron enjoyed the act more than the cleanup.

Two Peas in a Pod

You take them to the playground and all they want to do is walk around it. But you'll notice that now our ambition is to be just like our older brother. :)

Mom, we need to make sure puppy gets a present

2008-01-09T12:33:00.001-05:00

It was a good day... as good as it gets when Colin wakes up at 6:00am on a Saturday and crawls into our bed. But his biggest concern of the morning..."What if puppy odesn't get any presents from Santa?" At least he was thinking about someone other than himself. Here it is December 22 and he's dragging me out to the stores. The up-side... he was very decisive, knowing exactly what we should get each person on his "list".

Santa Claus is Coming to Town

2007-12-18T17:59:00.000-05:00

...and breakfast

The boys daycare had Santa come to breakfast. Colin was super excited about it. But Aaron was more than a little wary. Why should I go sit with that big guy in a red suit??? Therefore, Amber got to be in our Santa pictures, with Aaron clinging to her for dear life. (She tried once to set him in Santa's lap, but he was going to have none of that.)

Colin on the other hand, understands that Santa's a good guy. Who wouldn't want to pose with the guy that brings you presents?

Though, I do have to give Aaron a little credit. It was a rough morning, and his poor little mouth is hurting with his molars coming in.

Finally, Chirstmas Cheer

2007-12-18T12:12:00.000-05:00

Painters have come and gone, and we've mostly put the house back in order...so what comes next?? Decorating for christmas of course.
While the painters where here, Erick put up the outside decorations, and now it's done inside too.

"It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas, Ev'rywhere you go" (OK, you have to imagine the music with me).

The tree is up (including a train) with much help from Colin...and only a few broken ornaments. The boys love the fact that I found a train this year that is attached to the tree. Its about chest height on me, so it goes around the tree, but doesn't get in the way of presents under the tree. (And more importantly the train can't be grabbed by little hands.)--Train pictures to come...but the camera battery needed a charge

Checking up on Aaron

2007-12-12T13:00:00.000-05:00

Yeah, he's definitely no longer a baby, but he still had a 18 month Well-Baby/Child physical. And the doctor says he's growing (Aren't you surprised?)

Here's our latest stats:
Height: 32 1/2 inches (50 percentile) -- Not sure how accurate this was, he didn't sit still
Weight: 27 pds 10 oz. (50-75 percentile)

But we sure we're happy about having to get a shot (but the doctor says we're done until we turn five! Hurray!)

First Snow

2007-12-12T12:49:00.001-05:00

"Let's go build in the snow"
"Colin, there's not enough snow to build"...
"Let's go build in the snow"

Mom lost the arguement. It didn't matter that there wasn't REALLY enough snow to build with, there was plenty to play in.
Like childhood at its best, Colin thought this snowfall shouldn't be wasted. We shoveled a 1/4" off the drive and then headed to the park. The slide in the snow...why not...we were wearing snow pants :)

Paint...at last!

2007-12-12T12:11:00.000-05:00

After taking months to pick a color, and several more months to even call a painter, it is finally done. And I love it! Take a look at the new colors...

The Tree Lighting

2007-12-12T12:07:00.000-05:00

Well, the house was due to be painted, but that didn't stop my itch to start decorating for the holidays, so I enlisted a little help. Colin has been so excited about Christmas coming. Every days or so he'll ask me..."Is it Christmas today?" It's always a little disappointing to tell him no.
Since we couldn't decorate downstairs, Colin and I got out the small tree and decorated it in his bedroom. At three and a half, there is no better nightlight than your own Christmas tree. He wanted to put every decoration we could find on the tree, but I had to restrain him. But he was so excited to be able to help.
Here's a picture of Colin's tree.

Not really related, but we finally got the whole family together for dinner. Here's the whole big pile of cousins (happily in Papa's chair).

The Greatest Show on Earth

2007-12-12T11:56:00.000-05:00

Mom wanted to be a kid again, so she took the whole family to the circus. The entire time on the way there (and for many weeks before-hand) worrying about Aaron being too young to enjoy, and keeping two kids in their seats for the show. Plus I obviously don't know much about seating at the Palace. Tickets were in row "CC", so I thought "Great! Way in back...we'll never keep the kids interested." What a surprise for me, our seats where third row off the floor, right about where the center court is on the basketball court. The action was right in front of the kids. Neither child was going to miss a minute of the action.
Aaron's chubby little hand was constantly pointing at one thing or another. The "dog" (really an elephant) really caught his attention, but his favorite was the Cossacks on their horses. Every time one came by, he would point and tell me "horse" (not that it really sounded right...comes out sounding more like hose...but you get the point :) )
Colin's favorite was the motorcycles. They had 7 motorcycles all going around in this globe. At first he covered his ears because of the noise, but as he watched his hands dropped off his ears as his jaw dropped. It was all he could talk about for days. He was so excited to go to school the next day to tell Miss Abby about the circus.

Fall Fun

2007-11-20T21:01:00.001-05:00

Aaron & Friends

Aaron wakes up mom and collects all his friends to come downstairs in the morning. It's always an armful to carry them all down.

10/27/2007 - Halloween Craft Time

It craft time for the family. Everyone thought they had heard Colin wrong when they asked what he was going to be for Halloween. "I'm going to be a window" Originality at it's best. And we managed to make him into a window...with a little help from friends. Amber & I sewed and glued and made his costume while Colin and Aaron did other Halloween crafts.

10/28/2007 - Pumpkin Picking

Most years we like to go to the pumpkin patch for pumpkins...but this year we just ran out of time. So we went to the local farmer's stand. Colin wanted to bring them all home but Aaron was a little pickier.

"What do you mean mom? The pumpkin's just the right size for me. Just watch me pick it up."

"OK, so I can't pick it up. I'll just climb on top...that way everyone will know this one's mine."

10/31/2007 - Halloween

Halloween came and the pumpkins had to be carved...or more accurately "decorated." Aaron's was very apt for his age and Colin's had quite a glow :)

So with the pumpkins decorated and lit, we were off to go trick-or-treating. Everyone wanted pictures of Colin's original window costume, but he wanted nothing to do with posing for the camera. (Come on mom...there's candy to get) Unfortunately, my child seemed to lose his manners somewhere...at one house he knocked on the door. When a woman answered he tells her, "We just want candy." We'll have to work on that for next year.

Aaron loved the candy. He just couldn't wait to get home to open it, so he started on his sucker, wrapper and all.

The Leaf Pile

What do you do when you have a backyard full of leaves? What else...rake them into a pile for the kids to jump in. (Note: They still haven't been removed, just re-raked into a nice size pile)
The first words when I got the rake out were, "Can we make a pile?" Colin's been so excited since. We've had three weekends of leave jumping fun.

Aaron, on the other hand wasn't so sure about being in the leaf pile. But he did enjoy getting to use his brother's rake to add more leaves to the pile.

And here is Colin's greatest accomplishment...the leaf slide. The leaves are piled up the slide and then you slide through them.

And if you're not careful you may find a daddy monster in the leaf pile. (Note to self: Tickle fights in the leaf pile are not good. Leaves up the back of the shirt are itchy)

Fall Biking
Everyone seems to think we're quite a sight when we go biking with the kids. Erick hauls both boys behind himself on what we have nicknamed "the Train". It was a perfect day for fall biking...high 50s and sunny. We couldn't ask for better weather.

Too Much

Finally, we managed to wear Aaron out. After a day full of leaves and bike riding he was still going strong. So the next day Amber and I took him shopping all day. We stopped for ice cream (which of course he loved), but after getting back in the car he was out like a light within minutes.

Bad Blogger

2007-10-27T13:04:00.000-04:00

OK...I have to admit it. I've been a very bad blogger. I started the blog, and never came back to update it. So here it goes, here's what's happened the last month in the Mile household.

9-14 Colin Goes on a Big Boy Trip & Little Boy Makes a New Friend

Colin went up north with Grandma and Papa, without mom and dad. He had a great trip full of adventures with Grandma. Grandma and Colin went to the East Jordan Glass Works were they watched glass bowls being made. Then they invited Colin to the backroom with Grandma to make a Christmas ornament. What a wonderful birthday surprise for mom!

So while Colin went a away to play, Aaron had friends over. Erick and I had a wedding to attend, so Amber came for the weekend and brought her nephew Jeremy. He and Aaron had a great time.

9-22 Mom celebrates 29 on a bike!

In order to celebrate mom turning 29, Erick, Aaron, and my friend Amber joined me on a bike ride. We went from Rochester to Armada and got ice cream.

Everyone throughly enjoyed the 39 mile ride, but Amber and Aaron were quite tired by the time we made it back to the car. Amber laid down on the parkinglot pavement, and Aaron joined her. :)

Just Hanging Around the House

Taking it easy and just hanging around the house for a couple evenings makes for some great pictures:

You!

Aaron loves to try to get the camera :)

Aaron thinks he's ready to play baseball. I think he needs to be able to hold the baseball bat up higher first. :)

9-29 Our Wedding Anniversary

We couldn't have asked for a prettier day for our wedding anniversary, so we spent it with the kids at the zoo. All the animals were out and about. The tigers and bears were posing for pictures.

10-6 Camping in October
It was a weekend you rarely see for October, so we took advantage of it and went camping. Before we went we set the tent up in the garage to make sure there were no holes. Colin got so excited he wanted to go that night.

This is Colin's "Picture Rock". He thought it was perfect for picture taking, and since I didn't have the camera at the time, we had to go back for a few shots.

Camping was lots of fun, but it was hard work.

Final Thoughts for the night: Remember to feed the Baby

I promise...we do feed Aaron. He just likes to eat post-its and try to write on them at the same time.

Yum, Ice Cream

2007-09-11T22:52:00.001-04:00

Dinner was fun and messy...but ice cream makes me happy!

Bike Racing Adventures

2007-09-09T22:00:00.000-04:00

Erick entered his first Mountain bike race this weekend at Stoney Creek. He finished 17^th out of 21 racers in his division.
To kill some time while Erick started his race, mom thought it would be a good idea to take the kids biking around the lake at Stoney. Mom pulled the tag-along bike with Colin on it, which pulled the trailer with Aaron in it. No pictures, but we must have quite the sight... we made it around all 6 miles!

So here we are, a very tired crew, waiting to cheer for dad.

As we got more tired, we got even more grouchy. I keep the camera around to entertain us at such times. Colin just wasn't liking the entertainment as much as Aaron.

Finally, here's Daddy crossing the finish line.

(Sorry it's a little blurry...we noticed it was dad on our way to the potty...

"Can you hold it Colin? Mommy wants a picture of daddy.")

Butterflys

2007-09-08T22:43:00.000-04:00

Butterflys... Where'd we go? The zoo? A park? No, actually only to the local Bordine's for plants. But they were pretty enough to warrant pulling the camera out.