spiders in a brown bag {GROW!}

i am overdoing my garden this year.

it is a for sure thing.

but if there's one thing i've learned about gardening,

it's that once you finally get it all in the ground,

the more the merrier.

the more i plant, the less weeds i get.

at least once everything is really growing.

so sean's cousin tiff came up this week and we started our seeds together.

she brought me a brown lunch sack and giggled when she handed to me.

when i opened it i thought she brought me spiders.

creepy little potato stems!!!

so gross.

so i've got my little garden growing to the left of my kitchen sink these days.

covered in saran wrap as a makeshift greenhouse,

and i tell you, it makes winter feel like a thing of the past!

next week i'll be rushing to them each morning to see if any have sprouted.

it's fun fun fun business.

i've started your standard big red tomatoes,

sweet 100 cherry tomatoes,
green zebra tomatoes,

jalapenos, anaheims, 

brussel sprouts,

walla walla's, green bunch onions,

purple cauliflower {tiff brought this up, it's a special treat!},

kale,

cilantro, basil, and rosemary.

and those are just the ones you can start early:)

there are at least 10 more packets of things that i'm putting straight into the ground 

at the end of may when we rotatille.

i can hardly wait to see my pumpkins and corn growing each morning 

out of my kitchen window this summer.

now for the motivation to get out there next week to plant my early peas...

sweet, snap, early peas.

i have never been able to get myself in the mood to go out and plant in the cold months for the cold peas.

but i always want them by the time it starts to get warm.

you have to do things you don't want to do,

so you can do the things you want to do.

this is what i'm telling myself inside of my head.

we will see if it gets me out to plant my peas.

happy friday.

grow little seeds,

GROW!

a warm tush

heating vent and a balloon.

baby's best friend.

it levitated over the heating vent,

bobbing up and down.

i mean, even i was impressed.

but he was mesmerized,

and all of it with a warm tush.

it's great to be 5 {the birthday post}

brennan,

you make me laugh every day.

you are so smart it freaks me out sometimes.

and your memory is out of this world.

you can write your entire 7 letter name all by yourself.

you know your letters and numbers.

you love preschool and miss kim.

you love tv.

love is an understatement.

your favorite tv show is wild kratts.

you know crazy amounts of information about animals from watching this show.

you also love my little pony.

you and max will sit and watch episode after episode.

you always ask to see what happens next at the time.

i will be so sad when you find out it's a girl show and don't want to watch it with her anymore.

you also love watch hulk, spiderman, ironman, etc.

and ruff ruffman.

you love playing video games.

on my phone.

on the wii at cade's house.

and on cade's DS.

your favorite video game is Smash Brothers.

again, love is an understatement.

you'd play video games and watch tv the entire day if we let you.

you have huge tantrums when we tell you it's time to turn them off.

we turn them off anyway.

you cry and scream and say "i'm gonna go crazy at you!"

it's really REALLY funny.

as of last week you get embarrassed easily.

you love all super heroes,

but lately you love batman the most.

spider-man is a close second.

i never thought i'd see the day where spider-man got bumped to be the 2nd.

you love chocolate milk.

and by chocolate milk i mean a big glass of milk with two scoops of ovaltine.

you like real chocolate milk too, but i never buy it for you.

as of two weeks ago you don't like to go to church.

mostly b/c you got in trouble for talking to cade during sharing/singing time.

you tell me you are "bored of this place and don't want to come to church anymore."

your best friends are cade, blake, and justin.

you wake up in the morning and ask to go to cade's house.

and then you ask all day until i say yes for you to go there or for him to come here.

whenever i need to bribe you with something i use cade.

it works like a charm:)

you have a bladder of steel.

you go pee before bed around 7:30pm, 

and sometimes if we have to get up and go somewhere early 

we will get to where we are going and you will tell me you have to go pee, 

and i will realize you never went when you woke up. 

sometimes it is already 10 or 11am.

it is amazing.

you ask for peanut butter toast every morning for breakfast,

but you will eat oatmeal, yogurt, pancakes, smoothies, etc. too.

you always ask for a peanut butter scoop with it.

and you want to scoop it yourself.

you always scoop half the jar out,

and i make you scoop some off.

you get mad.

i make you anyway.

the only thing you will not eat for breakfast is eggs.

you hate eggs.

you HATE to wash your hands.

you will run around in circles if you have to pee until someone takes pity on you 

and puts the seat up for you so you don't have to touch the potty and wash your hands.

b/c the rule is that if you don't touch the potty or your parts,

you don't have to wash your hands.

our neighbor brad's wife nikki found this rule out the hard way.

it is a really funny story.

ask me about it someday.

you always wake up first in our family.

we have trained you to get out of your room without waking max up,

but sometimes you wake her up and then she is all drama for the entire rest of the day.

i get mad when you do that.

but when you come out quietly and don't wake her up,

all is well in the gibson home.

sometimes you sleep until 8am and we are SO elated when you do this.

but, you almost always wake up early.

you always ask to go downstairs when you wake up in the morning.

we always want you to climb into our bed for a little bit b/c is is usually before 7am,

and you almost always get louder and louder and crazier and crazier at the side of our bed until dad finally rolls out of bed, puts his sweatshirt on, and takes you downstairs.

we can leave you downstairs by yourself for HOURS watching tv and playing on a phone in the morning.

i know you are safe and that you won't get into any trouble as long as you are by yourself with a chocolate milk, a banana, the tv on, and a phone in your hands.

it is a true gift, and i thank you for being so awesome.

it lets me sleep in and shower before the other kids wake up.

AWESOME:)

you will try anything as long as we bribe you.

even a goat cheese grilled cheese sandwich.

amazing.

you are the bravest little kid i have ever met.

again, you can always be bribed into anything.

sometimes i'm afraid of your teenage years b/c of this.

you have the softest, sweetest heart of any boy i know.

you observe everything you see and hear and remember it for months.

and will tell me about things that happened over a year ago with specific detail.

things that i would never imagine you would remember.

you have the thickest most beautiful brown hair.

your body is built solid.

but you are still afraid of the wrath of max.

sometimes she will come out at you with fists blazing, 

and you will cower and scream until someone saves you,

even though you could flick her with your finger and knock her tiny little self over in one flick.

you tease your sister and maul your brother all day long.

you are best friends with max.

it is so cute.

you usually decided the tone of our family.

if you're having a good day,

we are all having a good day.

and vice versa.

you say the sweetest things to me all of the time.

you tell me your love me, that i'm beautiful, and that i'm the bestest mom in the whole wide world.

it makes me feel so good.

you HATE showers.

hate is an understatement.

you LOATHE showers.

you cry and scream when we use the shower to get your shampoo and conditioner out of your hair.

then you demand a towel for your eyes and nose.

very high maintenance in the bath.

you LOVE LOVE LOVE to sit and soak in a hot bath.

you lay back in the hot tub full of bubbles like a frog on a platter and tell me you're "relaxing."

you call Netflix "neckflace," and ask to watch movies on it on my phone.

you tell us your brain tells you stuff.

and that there is a computer in your brain that thinks about stuff and a little man that talks to you in it.

like i said, FUNNIEST PERSON on the planet:)

you have an imagination to marvel others.

you and max come up with the best pretend games.

they usually involve super heroes, princesses, pirates, 

crocodiles or some other form of man-eating animal, and lately power rangers.

you say the red power ranger is the best.

max says the best is pink.

you fight with her that red is the best b/c girls are not the best and pink is not the best.

you all of a sudden think girls are yucky and you don't like them at all.

but then i remind you of all of the girls in your life that you love,

and you say those girls are ok, just not girls.

you LOVE sweets.

you want to eat them all of the time.

you ask for them at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

i once found you stuck hanging onto the pantry shelves b/c you got stuck climbing up to your halloween bucket to get a treat. i couldn't stop laughing.

i of course took a picture.

you fall asleep in about 2 minutes.

you ask me to scratch your back before you fall asleep, 

and you are SUPER specific about where you want to be scratched the entire time.

you always tell me to scratch you on the "scratchy spot."

high,

middle,

side,

high.

you want me to rotate the scratching all around.

funny kid.

you would have me scratch your back all day long.

tonight you came over by me at dinner b/c you wanted me to scratch your back during dinner.

you love having dad tell you a story at bedtime.

you usually stop him about 50 times during the story to tell him how you want the story to go and who is going to be in the story, and what names everyone will have in the story.

you always say "i need to tell you some-PING"  before you tell us anything.

and now max does it too.

i love the way you say some-PING with a pronounced "P."

it is darling.

you love it when i sing baby beluga to you every night.

you usually tell me i have stinky breath.

you know the words and will close your eyes and smile,

{sometimes you will lip sink along}

nodding your head to the beat of the song as i sing it.

it makes me SOOOOO happy to see you so happy:)

you love to read books.

you will look at books by yourself for a long time,

and lately you especially love lego comic books.

you love to be in water.

during the summer you will swim for 8 hours straight.

i make you get out on the side of uncle dave's pool to eat every few hours 

and you always get back in for more.

you have been that way your entire life.

when you were a brand new baby i would take you swimming every afternoon when you woke up from your nap b/c it was the only thing that would make you happy and keep you from crying.

a true water baby from birth.

temperature does not phase you.

you are never cold or hot.

if you are, you don't ever tell me it bothers you.

whenever i tell you we are going to the doctor you tense up and hold your breathe and ask me if you are going to get a shot. you always sigh a big sigh of relief if you are not.

you love to kiss chase.

hug chase.

tackle chase.

squeeze chase.

pull chase.

and climb in his crib when he wakes up.

i'm so glad we don't have a dog.

i love you and your little cabbage patch hands.

every night i check to make sure they are still there.

then i kiss them.

i love to kiss your head right by the side of your eyes and between your nose.

before i go to bed i come in and kiss you one time in each spot and run my fingers through your thick handsome hair.

i love and adore your big puppy dog brown eyes.

i usually have to move you back to your pillow and shift you around b/c you fall asleep in the weirdest positions in your bed.

you can sleep through anything.

you love to be held and be cuddled.

you are strong-willed and know what you like.

i am so proud that you are my son.

i love you my baby brennan.

how are you 5???

love,

mom

{you spent your $5 of birthday money on .99 cent games on my phone.}

{you ordered a chocolate peanut butter milkshake. YUM.}

 .....

75% in height and weight.

perfect vision and hearing.

 i've said it before and i'll say it again.

4 and 5 year old boys are the funniest people on the entire planet.

this kid and the the things he says.

he makes me laugh every single day.

THE END.

hammer marks in the paint

it took us two days to buy everything.

4 trips to home depot.

half a day to get the wood to the proper lengths.

who knew the left wall would be a half an inch shorter than the right?

not me.

which is why when i measured the right side to be 24",

i figured i'd need two 24" pieces of ply wood.

i was wrong.

then it took half a day to caulk and paint.

which i did during the sleeping hours of the night.

then 2 hours to tape off the delicate parts and finish up painting.

which i did during some people's sleeping hours of the night.

then an afternoon to hammer half of the hardware knobs.

and another afternoon to hammer the other half of the hardware and knobs.

projects with little kids require phases.

this is what i'm learning.

we had no idea what we were getting into,

but i'm so glad we got into it.

i love to paint.

very therapeutic.

AND

sean is handy with a nail gun.

who knew?

lesson learned: it always takes longer and more work than you think it will take and be.

kind of like raising kids.

good thing though,

b/c even with the hold ups and the mistakes,

and the hammer marks in the paint,

i'm so happy with how it's turning out.

the closet too;)

anyone else think i have the downstairs of downton abbey in my coat closet now??? 

genius by mistake:) glory be!

a big thanks to the heyborne family for loaning us their nail gun!

coming soon: the OFFICIAL after picture.

a map and a plan. SPRING.

 "i am drawing a map and a plan to get to cade's house tomorrow. And we will play smash brothers. 

And then we will go to justin's house, blake's house, and eden's house. so that's the plan." 

-brennan 5 yrs old

 {she's loved laying on the grass ever since she was a baby. GEM. click here to remember.}

spring is here.

and it feels amazing:)
i think my lips are sun burnt...