A Bonding Experience

Our kids (like I always say) are blessed with so many young cousins their age.  Cohan is 6 months in between Avery and Mack.  They have been growing up together and slowly through the two in a half years have begun to play with each other.  It's fun to watch them interact and get to have a buddy that is also family.

We haven't seen Cohan in a while and haven't had much time with him now that they are getting older.  We decided (for our sanity) we needed to get out of the house this weekend, so we headed to the lake.  Nanny and Papa H. were going as well and brought their cousin.  It was so nice to get to know him more and to get the kids used to playing together without fighting over toys.  It took some time to end the bickering, but once they got over that it was total chaos!!!  I am learning to embrace the chaos and kept stating this during the evening.

It really reminded me of how crazy I would get with my cousins.  I'm pretty sure it was stressing their Papa out, but how can you tell two 2 year olds and a 3 year old to stop running and having fun?  They played, played, oh and played all day and into the night.  We did have to get out of the house and attempted eating dinner out...it was okay minus the water spilt on me by my two year old:)

Below are pictures from this truly amazing bonding experience for our kids.  We hope he can come over for a sleep over soon!  

Breakfast at the lake

Mack doesn't have pants on for most of the pictures...potty training:)

My kids don't get to stay at Nanny and Papa H's house very often, so all the toys were new and fun to explore!

watching boats was a huge activity

After dinner we snuggled up on the couch to watch a movie

These two are great buddies.  They were pretending together-mostly Avery was the baby and Cohan was the mommy

Yes, this was moon sand and yes they had fun and yes it was one of the biggest messes I've EVER seen!

The kids got out of the house, got time with their cousin, and time with their grandparents.  They are exhausted, but it was worth it.  I think we have found a way to keep our sanity during this time with Mack...head to the lake!!