neighbors, ugh

I whine continually about the neighbor kids. Now the OTHER neighbor has her 8 and 6-yr-old nephews staying with her for a month or so this summer. Our yard is bigger and has MUCH less landscaping, so it has become the neighborhood baseball field. Logan is THRILLED with these bigger, better baseball boys and would play ball with them from dawn to dusk. The 6-yr-old is only 6 months older than Logan, but he's a baseball superstar. The kid is seriously good. The usual lineup is 6-yr-old batting, 8-yr-old pitching and Logan retrieving the hit balls from the disgusting weedy woods barrier between the road and golf course. The boys are nice and fair- they pitch to Logan and are patient with his um, suckfulness :)

I'd actually be thrilled with their visit and all the baseball practice Logan's getting if it wasn't for the OTHER neighbor boys! (Kaylin and the girl happily stay out of the way.) I'm spending pretty much ALL of my evenings outside making sure Little Boy (just turned 3) and Baby Boy (just turned 1) don't get whacked with bats or balls. The little guys think Logan's pretty cool, but the baseball boys are AWESOME!!!! They totally gravitate to the baseball boys. The big boys aren't quite old enough to REALLY watch the little boys and the little boys definitely aren't old enough to understand to stay away from the batter. So I sit outside and distract the little boys and set up the plastic tee a million times so they can hit plastic balls and stay out of danger.

You might wonder why on earth I'm babysitting the little neighbor kids? I'm not, really. Their mom is usually over. She is just too stupid to keep both boys distracted at once so she usually watches the baby while I holler at the 3-yr-old to stay out of the way. The mom was playing with the baby in the "outfield" last night and got hit by one batted ball and had a couple of near misses before she FINALLY got the hint and moved to a different area of the yard. The woman is a dingbat!

Yesterday I was out running errands and Gene wanted to mow the backyard. The big boys were playing ball in front. BOTH little neighbor boys came over with mom nowhere in sight. Gene finally grabbed the baby and walked right into their house and asked the mom to please keep them home until he was done mowing because there was no way he could watch them. Can you imagine allowing your one-yr-old outside to play unsupervised with his THREE-yr-old brother??? We live on a very quiet street, but COME ON!!! My kids have been begging for an inflatable pool bigger than their small plastic baby one. Absolutely Not. Unless we lock our gate I would NEVER trust these neighbor parents. We will have no pool that can't be dumped immediately after each use!!!

Anyway, that's what I've been up to this week. (Sorry for not calling Mom, but I've been distracted and then think to call at 5:30 AM.)

We took the kids to the HOI Fair yesterday. It gets lamer and more boring every year. We somehow managed to spend FIVE HOURS though. Even the kids were ready to leave! I think being forced to watch the Rainbo Cloggers while we ate dinner kind of threw us all over the edge :) We were FINALLY done with rides and exhibits and farm animals. I promised the kids a bag of cotton candy and we had to walk a little to get it. It was the last thing we did before we left. Who do you think we bumped into on our little walk???? You guessed it! The neighbors! We never talk to them about what we're doing but we apparently ALWAYS do the same thing at the same time!!!