Long Day Out with the Boys

The other day the boys and I enjoyed one of those mommy & 4 sons adventure days.  We had a birthday party in the morning and then an afternoon and evening at a friend's house.  It was great.  They were all in good spirits about the fun day out and I just enjoyed getting to focus on quality time with the  boys instead of all the to-do's at home.  

Penn's preschool friend was the birthday boy.  His party was at the Children's Museum.  We've never attended a party there, but it was so great!  And the hosts were so generous with a huge spread of food and lots of thoughtful for the kids (and not to mention the whole museum at our fingertips!).  Here are the boys making their craft (birdhouses).

The boys had a blast playing up in the garage.  Penn is counting down for Koen before he launches a rocket.  So dramatic!

LED light strings apparently make great monkey vines??!!

 The boys enjoyed the new Vietnam exhibit.  Mostly the Vespa and Fireworks interactive displays.

So after about 3 hours at the museum, Janse-man was just done (but super sweet about it).  So we took off for Nate and Megan's.  They needed a sitter for a few hours that afternoon and so I had offered to have Jansen nap there and then hang with my boys and theirs.  Yep, that's right...me and 6 boys.  It went great!  The boys are all buds as you can see here.

And we were blessed with great weather, so we spent a lot of time outside.

I spent a lot of time on the swing with Penn Rye, but I also got to toss the football with Koen (which later turned into a major game of monkey in the middle with Tav, Andy and Alex being the monkeys of course).

The boys watched "Frosty the Snowman" for some downtime.  Janse woke up during that time and joined the big boys for a little bit.  I just had to take a picture of the whole crew.  Don't miss that Jansen is smiling so cutely and that big brother Koen has to have him right next to him.  Love it.

Nate and Megan got home around 5pm and soon after Megan and I skipped out on a brief walk with Jansen in the stroller (and left Nate to fend for himself with the other 5 boys).  Then when we returned from some girl chat/exercise we fed the kids dinner and then it was time to get these tired Melder boys to bed.  It was a long day out with the boys, but such a nice change to be out through the afternoon just enjoying time together and with friends.  And PS - we all slept good that night!