'Papa turns Grrrrrandpa visits!!!!

The title is in reference to Forrest suddenly deciding Papa is now Grrrandpa, with the hard r and all. He actually says it pretty well, we'll have to see how it all sorts out :-)
My Dad came for Mr. Talin's festivities as well as a much anticipated bike ride with me and his Eugene friend, Rob. We had a blast! The ride was awesome, and my McGiver Dad even saved the day and was able to make my two broken spoke wheel into something rid-able at mile 35 which was our little adventure of the day. We also took some great walks and the weather was great. I'll put up the bike ride pictures in another post. Enjoy!

Forrest and his crazy eyes...

stroller vs. 4 year old, guess who won?

Talin Turns TWO!!!

Two Years Young....on the afternoon of his birthday, barefoot and carefree :-)

Cutie blondie big TWO year old!

This year Talin and I did a bit of a switch a roo on the whole Birthday/Mother's Day dealio. You see, my Mother's Day was to ride a big bike ride with my Dad, which is a complete sans kids event. Soooo, I took Talin's big May 11th day for the Tour of the Unknown Coast, (pictures to come later,) and we celebrated Talin's big day May 12th, Mother's Day with an ice cream party!
Peanut butter chocolate sauce, homegrown strawberries, M&M's, and more, what more could any kid or adult want??? For us hungry post big bike rider parents and grandparents, it was heaven. And judging from the looks on these kiddo's faces, it was pretty darn good for them as well!

YUM MOM! I'll take this one, and this one, and two of that one.....

Checking out all the special ice cream toppings

Talin didn't quite know what to think with all of his neighbor friends singing to him!

Happy little guys

Our neighbors and family friend Rob were there to help celebrate with Talin!(notice the new construction in the background...boys' new room, YAY!!!)

Talin and his 'Papa....what more could a two year old want...or need!

“Bicycles may change, but cycling is timeless." -- Zapata Espinoza

"I love you SO much Mom..."

I hear these words fairly often from Forrest. Often they are after I have given him a special treat he has earned, or put on a movie or show for him, or sat down to read a bunch of books with him. But equally as much are those times that make you pause, and then melt. Because it makes you realize that he acknowledges you as a person and understands your likes and dislikes and respects this. Kind of hard to put into words.
Tomorrow I have a big test. I have to take my PA board re-certification exam. It's a 240 question test, I'm given 4 hours, and well, it's kind of a big deal. If I pass it, I won't have to re cert for another 10 years. I had no problem with my initial PA boards 6 years ago. But, there is no arguing that I may as well have been a different person back then. Studying was what I did, in between playing with Alex, and riding my bike. Marriage, two boys, a full time plus job, what's that? I won't go into just how impossible studying with a 4 year old and an almost 2 year old has been, that's a given. I'll just say thank goodness for technology! Podcasts of review topics have been my friends, making my driving time at least more useful to me.
So, tonight, Alex had an errand to run, I've been basically sitting on my butt for two days straight CRAMMING, (no better way to really put it...) all the asinine details of all of medicine into my brain.  For me this is driving me crazy. I like to be useful, see patients, treat them, fix them with surgery if they need it, exercise, ride my bike, cook for my family, provide for my family, to sum it all up, I just like to MOVE. So, no bike time for the last few days was kind of crappy so I decided to put on a little Myth Busters for Forrest and do a little 20 minute circuit. I was in the middle of a major quad burning 90 second wall sit and Forrest, who had been half enraptured in the movie, and half distracted by what I was doing asked what I was doing. I explained, told him it was making me stronger but my legs were burning, and he touched them and offered some ice to "cool them off" :-) I told him it was okay, and then he offered his blankie as when he is burning in the sun his blankie makes him feel better. I again declined and he continued to stare at me and then came the

"I love you SO much Mom..."

Now this could be just a random thing, or it could have been, perhaps, him acknowledging my crazy, albeit small amount of hard work, and maybe an understanding of why I was doing it.

Regardless, it made my night...!

These little people sure are amazing.

Now back to business....

Afternoon Stroll

Little Man with a mission

 I don't think I need to tell anyone else about the gorgeous weather we're having, I think it pretty much includes the entire west coast!  Foggy Eureka who normally never hits above 72 as a high in a year was in the mid 80's today. CRAZY! Out in our neck of the woods, (hehe!) it's actually just perfect. High 80's, low 90's, and gorgeous. A bit breezy in the evenings but we're out and about as much as possible.

 These two guys LOVE the outdoors. I guess any kid growing up in our household would at least learn to like the outdoor life at least a bit, but I do think we're pretty blessed that these babes just adore it. Forrest would have stayed outside, in the sun, sans clothes of course all day if I hadn't had mandated a rest time. He then crashed for a good 2hours which I know his body needed. Talin is absolutely more fair, we're going to have to watch his delicate white baby skin this year. But he also loves to run and play, go on walks, check on the garden, and all the other fun stuff you can get into outside!

Using our single trusty BOB over and over again for these two boys!

I'm not sure what we're all looking at but a cute picture of these two little guys nonetheless!

And since loosing our wonderful river beach for awhile while the mighty Trinity rages for a bit, I've invested in this year's water toys! Forrest loves the new shark slip n slide, (which I must admit, from personal, uhh, use, is VERY fun!!! no better way to cool off after a bike workout than slide in a water drenched shark mouth!)
Here's a little peak into our walk, thanks to Magisto. I don't necessarily know if I would have included our conversation about Ticks into the chosen moments, but, ahh well, life in the sticks! Enjoy!

Early river rugrats...

We hardly ever get to enjoy our river this early in the year. In fact, starting yesterday they started their yearly release of water down the river which takes away our beach usually for the better part of 6 weeks.This year, however, we snuck in a few river afternoons, capitolizing on the wonderful weather we've been having before the big release. And....this year is classified as a dry year for us, (uggh) so they are releasing far less water down the river and we will get our beach back by early June...maybe! I guess this is one little plus on the whole negative side of looking at a drought year and possibly a very hot summer.
Regardless, we enjoy our beach so much. Forrest has a blast down there. He's not quite swimming yet, as the river is very cold, but he has a great time making sand castles, throwing rocks, and just enjoying our little piece of paradise. Talin is very cute as well, but has a bit of an issue with the sand, and dirty hands, and with his mama jumping in to cool off, (he'll have to get used to all of this and I'm sure he will!)
We're looking very much forward to this second home down on the bank of the Trinity River and enjoying time in paradise with our family and friends come this summer :-)

Post #400...

From this post, till now, these two little guys have come into our world. Looking back on my very first Fultmeyer blog entry I realize I didn't even have a title! Ha, probably just still figuring out what side was up at that point. I remember well, sitting, trying my hand at blogging, during a particularly slow ER shift, and thinking that I was never going to keep it up, and now look at me! Well, true, I am not by any means an all star daily blogger but I am proud of the fact I have documented a bit of our early family history on this sucker. I may not be the best at baby books, but blogging I like!
And from those early moments of Forrest's pregnancy, until now, we have two full blown kids! Not even babies, but little kids. CRAZY! It really does blow my mind how much can happen in 4 years, and 400 blog posts ;-) And not to mention our house, car, jobs, etc. that all changes along with the years as well.  Here is to another 4+ years and 400 stories about our life with these two great boys!

Brotherly Love...

Perhaps not always displayed in a "loving" way, nonetheless these two boys do love each other and seeing them interact, as crazy as it may be tops my recent parenting moments by far! Despite the absolutely crazy, hair graying, aging, ear screeching moments, there are so many of the sweet, kind, funny, amazing, and very loving moments as well that I need to try and document a bit better...

Forrest here is so proud he "taught Talin how to climb in the crib all by himself!" He then had T demonstrate it about 20 times ....;-)

"hiding from the monsters"

Popsicle love...Forrest demonstrating to his brother the perfect way to consume his special treat down!

art, together, for a grand total of 3 minutes...:-)

They already have a great bond, even with Talin not yet 2 years old. They are a bit of ying and yang, though both very adventurous, both loving the outdoors, and both our perfect boys in their own way.

We've got Greens!!!

MMM MMMM a lot of salads coming up!

Red sail lettuce

Made my day, Talin chewing up a bok choi leaf! Probably the first veggie he had eaten all week as he's quite the picky one...Forrest and I were snacking on the new red sail as well :-) He actually ate most of this!

Forrest surveying the sprouting potatoes

Bok choi is plentiful! Yummy!

A little rice goes a long way...

...or maybe this is a lot of rice, when you compare it to say what we would eat for dinner. However, this Sunday I decided to transform the kids old water table that isn't often used into a rice table. We buy rice in bulk, so I swiped some from our 20 quart containers, (my frugal MIL may not agree...sorry Gloria!) and made a smaller rice container in a tuppaware for Forrest, with the intent of practicing name recognition with him. I quickly realized after rice was surprisingly appearing on the floor, (couldn't see that coming!) that a bigger container was needed and wola, the rice table happened!
Both boys love it and this way both can play at the same time. Ever so often we take a break from playing and dig through the rice in search of names. He can recognize about 1/2, we're working on the others, (Granny and Grandma are the hardest of the bunch...)chocolate chips make great motivation!
I'm not sure how long it'll last, but he's still playing around in it at the moment...already worth the 10 or so cups of rice we sacrificed I'd say :-)

Trying the too small rice container....

the dinosaurs were eating the trees and 'mcqueen' was saving the tree....

Talin making his special rice juice...;-)