He gets it from his Mama.

The Procrastinator

It's like being the Terminator, but waiting until the last minute to try to kill Sarah Connor. I'm joking. Cyborgs don't know HOW to procrastinate.
Hello, my name is Brandi. And I'm a procrastinator. But not just ANY procrastinator, mind you. A randomly productive one. I've been practicing this art for years.

Perhaps I would rather paint the inside of my cabinet doors with chalkboard paint than put away the stacks of laundry that have accumulated on my guest room bed.

But seriously. So much cooler than putting away laundry.

I can WRITE on the inside of my cabinet doors y'all!

Now stop distracting me. I have to alphabetize my Christmas Decorations put laundry away.

Dude

Austin really needs to make some guy friends. At this rate, we have guesstimated that in his Senior year of High School he could be taking 5 girls to prom. Which could work, because they will all be at different schools. But that means we will have to just go ahead and just BUY a tuxedo. Because renting a tux 5 times is just throwing away money.

Which one of these is not like the others?

Just Cuz

Yep. More cousin adventures. Go to the bathroom and then grab a snack. You're going to be here for a while. Get something for me too. Didn't your mama teach you to share?

We went to Connecticut to pick up my cousin and little R.

In turn we got to hang out with their new little friend M. In the cow print leg warmers that you just squealed over.

I wanted to squeeze her the whole time we were there.

Their first night together.

I should have known.

Did I mention that the friend we visited in Connecticut lived in one of those AMAZING old homes that they feature in Ethan Allen sometimes? The ones with a super creepy basement that I asked to see?

(My cousin and her bestie.)

Breakfast at the town General Store.

A store.

With generally needed items like breakfast.

Then we picked looked at flowers and R caught butterflies.

Totally ninja.

And they walked home barefoot.

Forgive us Connecticut.

We were raised in the south.

When we got home, they took care of some important business.

Like Playdoh.

And trains.

And those plastic bubble blowers that we had in the 80's.

Then we made Gingerbread Men.

Because.

Teamwork.

How REAL men decorate cookies.

Then we hit up the local Children's Museum.

Austin was taking out a loan for a power wheels.

Practicing their emergency response skills.

Then came lunch at the Circus Cafe.

We ALL only ate our lunch so we could get this bad boy for dessert.

Carousel ride. Check.

Making wishes in Congress Park.

And feeding the ducks.

This is how girls drink from fountains.

And that was how a boy did it.

The cotton candy sugar high was wearing off.

So we got some ice cream.

Pajama story time at the book store.

They had a freakishly gigantic mouse and cookies.

Maybe not the best idea at 7:00 at night?

At least R's shoes were fabulous.

I kind of loved having a little girl in the house.

I got to make fancy sandwiches.

A short drive to Lake George and then up Prospect Mountain for an Adirondack view.

We had to hike to the very top.

Austin smoked us all.

At this point I believe big R and I were using oxygen masks and crawling on our hands and knees.

R & R

(tehehehehehe)

I totally wiped the eye holes on that thing with a disinfecting wipe.

No pink eye for us thankyouverymuch.

I love this boy.

Are you exhausted yet?

Time for some crawfish hunting.

And mud flinging.

Austin was a little freaked out by the Little Mermaid.

The two of them devised a plan to catch the bunny that lives in our back yard.

It involved a trail of carrots from the shed to the trampoline wherein they would trap the bunny and love it, and squeeze it, and call it George. Unfortunately a hungry black dog (who shall remain unnamed) had other plans for their trail of carrots.

Bedtime?

What's that?

I know what you are thinking. Is that ALL you did with your cousin Brandi?

Nope. We also went swimming in the lake, visited a wildlife center, had a pedicure night (Austin included- don't tell his Father), made tie dye t-shirts and apple picking (oh wait- you already knew that), made bead bracelets, jumped on the trampoline, big R taught me how to make an Indian food dish, took a nice long hike (and then a run to CVS for poison ivy soap), had brunch at a fabulous local restaurant, did some downtown Saratoga shopping, annnnnnnnnd the mommies MAY have had one late evening that involved a bottle of Argentinean wine and the movie Bridesmaids.

I wish they lived closer so we could do cool stuff with them ALL of the time!

Now I'm going to go take a nap.

Apples to Apples

One of the coolest experiences in Upstate New York has to be apple picking in the Fall. I LOVE picking apples. Usually when we go, it's cool and breezy. We wear sweaters and sip on hot apple cider while walking through the orchard.

When I took my cousin and her baby girl R, it was upper 80's and felt like the surface of the sun. I'm pretty sure the trees were sweating.  I know I was. But they were only here for a week and they were going to pick apples gosh darn it!

 We rode a tractor out to the orchard.

 Then Austin and R shared the bag.

 And decided it was too hot to walk.

 But not too hot to eat an apple.

 They shared the apple too.

 And then they had JUST enough energy to run up a hill.

Austin's pretty fast for a little guy!

 Totally typical interaction for these two.

 The frequency of love/hate exchanges made for a super fun afternoon.

 My cousin Rachel and her little R.

 When we made them stand by the height chart they both had the best faces.

 The best angry faces.

R was probably still upset about the fact that Austin had just shared his handful of dirt by throwing it at her face. Then he shot her with his super hand lasers.

I honestly never thought I would be yelling "we do not shoot our cousins with lasers!" in the middle of an orchard. Yay boys.

 But they were both feeling much better after some ice cream and donuts.

Yep. Ice cream AND donuts.

Mom of the year. Right here.

And Rachel and I felt much better after eating these raspberry pastries.

All of them.

And then maybe a donut.

If you need a fabulous orchard with "pick-your-own" apples check out Bowman Orchards.

I'll be going back as soon as it gets cool enough for sweaters and hot apple cider!