Tag Archives: tyler run

January 16-31, 2020

Going back in time to put together some posts that I’m behind on. Our worries were far less back in January! Reid and I are up and at em early this morning I figured I’d go back and put together some blogs. As I look through these pictures from school it seems like such a long time ago! Now, granted I’m putting together a January post in late March, but still, even though the boys have been out of school for two weeks it seems like all that has happened with the Coronavirus and various orders within Ohio started such a long time ago!

Griffin and Reid play together quite often. Reid basically imitates anything Griffin does from words and conversations to running, jumping, or any other physical activity. Things go from fun and laughter to screaming and fits in an instant around here!

I was able to volunteer at Tyler Run during the COSI on Wheels visit. I stepped up to the pH table and talked to the kiddos about the difference between acids and bases and did some hands on experiments with different liquids to determine if they were an acid or a base. It was a fun and fast afternoon! Griffin was excited to come to my table :).

Here Reid is playing in our refrigerator cubby in the kitchen. Our fridge has stopped keeping a consistent cool temperature. It fluctuates all over the place and unfortunately, the fix is to replace the entire cooling system which costs half as much as a new fridge. So the hunt is on for a new one, though it’s not as easy as you would think. It turns out our space is 33″ wide and most fridges are 35.75″ wide, ugh!

One afternoon I arrived home and Haya was cleaning up paper off the floor. I wasn’t sure what kind of activity they had done, but as it turns out she brought a balloon filled with confetti the color of which revealed whether she was having a boy or girl! She recorded a cute video asking each of the neighborhood kiddos what their thought was and then Griffin popped it with Reid sitting nearby. It was cute!

We celebrated Andy and Mom’s birthdays with dinner at Polaris Grill followed by dessert and presents at our house. We celebrated a bit early as Mom and Dad headed to Florida for the month of February! We also celebrated our neighbor Abbie’s birthday with a fun party at the Bolan’s house. Tons of kiddos played for quite a long time and little miss Abbie tore into her cake!

For Christmas I’d given Kevin an Order of the Moth membership at Nocterra, though honestly I forgot to give it to him, lol! Then I got a reminder of the Launch Party from Nocterra and gave him the belated gift. Thankfully I had it together enough to get a sitter back when I purchased it so we headed out for the launch party on a date night. We love hanging out at our community tap room!

Brutie is getting some love from all the Manning girls. I rode with Sarah to pickup Abbie from a retreat and the rest of the girls watched Griffin and Reid. It was a win-win for everyone.

This was a beautiful sunrise I captured upon leaving the driveway one morning en route to work. The picture isn’t nearly as pretty as it was in person, but you get the idea! This is Wyndbend.

The new office and restroom building inside our Shipping Facility is coming along quite nicely. Drywall is up and mudded!

November 24 – December 7, 2019

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Yay Griffin! He was nominated by his teacher as one of two classroom recipients of the 1st Quarter Teamwork Award! We were in Tennessee during the school wide assembly, but Mrs. Hale offered to present it to him in front of the class once we were back. It worked out perfectly where I was volunteering the Monday we returned so I was able to see him receive his award – he was surprised!

The video is here:

I stayed after to work with the kids on word lists. Griffin is doing really well learning more and more words all the time. He crushed his November goal – he learned 60 new words and the goal was 15!

We headed to Mansfield for Thanksgiving festivities on Tuesday evening after swim lessons. Mom had plenty of fun for the kids to enjoy while we were there including a placemat making activity and folders of worksheets and activity sheets – one for each kid! The various activities kept them occupied and having fun for quite some time while Amy and Andy were packaging seed orders. The weather was SUPER windy but at one point I looked out and it seemed calm so we decided to give covering the greenhouse a go while there seemed to be a lull in the wind. We got super lucky and were able to get it done (I didn’t think there was going to be anyway with nearly 30 mph winds!). Sadly, I didn’t take any photos of our work though I did get one of Kevin being silly in the woods.

On Thanksgiving morning we got up, I took Brutus on an early walk, and then we all packed up and headed to the Turkey Trot / Kids fun run which all the cousins participated in. It was a chilly morning and Reid refused to run, but Graham, Greta, Rowan, and Griffin got in a quick race. We headed back home and got ready to head to Enon for the Armstrong Thanksgiving while Mom and Dad watched the Bethune kids while Amy and Andy ran the 5k.

We enjoyed a nice Thanksgiving meal at lunchtime at Dave and Gayle’s home. We were able to spend time with everyone, Griffin played some football with his cousins, and we ventured out to feed the horses some carrots. Reid was so funny, he kept saying “he bit me, HAHAHAHA”. He did really well feeding them out of his own hand. He would giggle every time. And Griffin liked feeding and petting them too. They are nice and pretty horses.

We drove back to Mansfield where we had round 2 and a tasty Thanksgiving dinner at Mom and Dads. After a little relaxation we headed to bed and then it was up and at ’em for breakfast at Bob Evans to begin our annual Black Friday Shopping tradition. After gobbling up our breakfast we headed to Polaris, then to Easton where we got some items purchased off our list. We ended up at Bon Vie for our traditional dinner in the private circle room – it’s such a nice space! The kids put together their lego toys while we waited on dinner. After dinner we continued shopping some and got several more things accomplished – it was a successful outing!

On Saturday morning everyone woke up early so we decided to gun it and head to get our tree. It was originally forecasted to be a yucky rainy day but since it wasn’t raining and we had a noon OSU-Michigan game time we kicked it in to high gear. We arrived at Cackler Farms and made our way to the fields looking for a tall Canaan or Fraser Fir. There weren’t nearly as many options this year, but we found one and began cutting it down within 20 minutes of arriving! Kevin cut it down with no troubles and he hauled it to the barn. Whew, it’s a 12 1/2 foot Canaan fir! While Kevin was checking out, I headed to the playspace where the kids played in the cornbox and rode the slide. We always enjoy our visit there, though we’re thinking we may need to find a new place next year that has more options for larger trees!

Once we were home we were in full-on Buckeyes mode (notice the O-H,,,,,,, I-O below, which was Griffin’s idea).

Griffin continues to love all of his lovies. He regularly sorts them or organizes them by animal species, or puts them all down for a rest as he did here.

Reid is our mr. sassy pants. He is sweet yet sassy. He’s our firecracker. Goofy and short tempered. And we love him so!

One night I washed Brutus’ dog bed cover and didn’t get it back on before bedtime. When I awoke in the middle of the night I looked over and Lily had somehow made her way on the portion that was leaning against the wall! These dogs, they are spoiled and love their soft beds that’s for sure.

On December 1st, Kevin and I had a nice date night and went to the Amy Grant & Michael W Smith concert at Nationwide. It’s always a fun way to get in the spirit of Christmas and I love hearing the songs by both of them that bring back so many memories of Christmas for me growing up. Christmas wouldn’t be the same without them!

We decorated our tree on a weeknight which was great, except it took forever and Griffin went to bed at almost midnight. Kevin had been exhausted from work and not sleeping well, Reid was having a great time but was nearing his bedtime and so Kevin put Reid to bed and went to bed himself. So Griffin and I enjoyed Christmas music and put up so-many-ornaments! He loves it so much and he quietly sings Christmas songs as he puts up the ornaments. He’ll occasionally say “mom, I remember this one from last year!!” with so much excitement in his voice. He had been begging to decorate the tree for several nights before we were able to make it happen. As we got everything finished and cleaned up he proclaimed “mom, we forgot to have hot cocoa!!!”. At the hour of 11:30 we weren’t going there, so we rather enjoyed a sweet ice cream treat and then hit the hay very quickly. Bad mom award for such a late bedtime that night, but memories we made were fun so it doesn’t really bother me :).

The next evening there was a family Pottery night and book fair at Tyler Run. I helped setup the fair (as I’m helping with the large school book fair put on by the PTO in February). We ended up being super busy and the pottery painting was really successful also. It was the first time our school had done it. Griffin painted me a “surprise” mug and they each painted ornaments.

Here’s our Lily girl taking in some sunshine at the front door followed by a selfie I found on my phone of Finn 🙂

October 6-15, 2019

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Griffin really enjoyed outdoor soccer this fall. His confidence grew a bit each week and he really ran hard out there zooming after the ball. He had some nice passes and even was able to score. I really enjoyed watching him play (when I wasn’t finding a YouTube or Netflix show for Reid, or chasing Reid, lol.

Kevin and I went out for a date night to dinner and a Mercy Me concert with Chris and Sarah Manning. Crowder opened (and Micah Tyler but we didn’t get there in time to see him!) and he was really enjoyable also.

On Sunday we were outside enjoying the day and decided we wanted to burn some energy. We sprung a surprise bike trip on the boys and didn’t tell them where we were going until we were about to leave. We took a nice little bike ride across Jewett and through Calumet Farms, then throughout Worthington Hills and we ended up at the Hills Market down at 315 and Worthington Hills where we had lunch at Subway and ice cream treats from Hills Market. We knew we would be cutting it close with the weather as rain was on the way. Just as we finished lunch and were getting ready to head out in hopes of beating the rain a downpour ensued! So, we hung out under the covered patio at the shopping center and let the rain pass. We made it back up the b-i-g hill at the entrance to Worthington Hills and then eventually back home. It was fun! Just a whee bit nerve wracking going down the big hill toward 315, but Griffin stayed right beside me and did a fantastic job controlling his bike and speed.

Donuts with Dad was this week, however, there was a random fog delay the morning of, so it was postponed a day. Unfortunately, Kevin was headed to a conference in North Carolina so he wasn’t able to go with Griffin on Wednesday. Instead, he took Griffin to Tim Horton’s and picked up donuts to have a home. It was a win-win :). When Dad is away, we will play! Just kidding, we go out to eat once a week after swimming or gymnastics – this week we ended up at Culver’s.

Griffin is continuing to enjoy school. The bus ride may be his favorite part as he can trade Pokemon cards and various other things with his friends along the route to and from school. Next up: recess and math. This kid is doing awesome with his math skills. He is constantly crunching numbers in his head or outloud – addition, subtraction, multiplication. He is crazy about numbers. I was able to flex my time at work and volunteer to help with raffle tickets for the raffle baskets as a part of Fall Fest at lunch one day this week. We weren’t able to go to Fall Festival at Tyler Run this year as Kevin’s reunion was the same weekend. So instead of the money spent on a wrist band for rides, etc., we gave Griffin money to buy raffle tickets to drop in the raffle boxes during lunch. As it turns out – he won the ART basket! I had volunteered at lunch and then gotten home and a short bit later my phone rang “Tyler Run”. I was nervous for a quick second thinking it might be the school nurse again – but it was a friend of mine telling me Griffin had won a basket! I was able to go pick it up and have it at home by the time he got off the bus. Earlier in the day I had gone over to school to walk in the Fun Walk through the school neighborhood. It’s a fun day that I look forward to each year.

Friday afternoon we packed up and headed to Enon for Kevin’s Greenon High School 30 year Reunion. The weather turned rather yucky, but we forged ahead and took Griffin with us to part of the high school football game (in the rain!). He enjoyed watching them play and it was fun to get him the fun hot dog, skittles, and gatorade from the concession stand. Afterward, we took Griffin back to Grandma and Grandpa’s and Kevin and I headed to meet up with his classmates and Taylor’s Tavern. It was a fun evening meeting many of Kevin’s friends and listening to so many stories.

Saturday there was a gathering the The Bogey. There were a large number of people, yet a different group than Friday, who came. We spent several hours talking with Kevin’s old friends. There were also numerous yearbooks which were so fun to peruse and see pictures of Kevin back as far as 5th grade! Then on Sunday there was a tour of the High School (they will be razing it within a year as a new one is being built) so we took the boys on a walk through of Daddy’s old hallways and then they raced a lap on the track before we headed home.

Reid is such a silly boy sometimes. On this afternoon he put Haya’s hair band on his head. She sent me this picture and I just had a chuckle. He’s a little silly entertainer. He also makes pretty expressive faces, see the picture of him sniffing my coffee one morning. I’ve signed Reid up for gymnastics which he absolutely loves. Pure joy on his face as he runs to the bell to ring it at the start of the class. We got in the car after the second week and he said “mama, that fun!”