A brother's love....

A birthday present for his sister. He chose the outfit and the name. Meet Polly.

Sunday Funday

Bring out the gates...

Up until now, Avery has never bothered with the stairs. She was very cute tonight, though, trying to figure out how to lift up her legs to attempt the climb. The funniest part is that each step is knee-high to her. She seems so tiny compared to what Logan was at this age - but that's probably because he was all we knew, whereas she is constantly beside her brother who is that much bigger.

Last Game

Last game of the season! Logan had so much fun with soccer - he just loves it. He's especially proud that he has mastered the art of the secret, sneaky backwards kick! The picture above is during practice when he had to zig zag with the ball and try to score a goal.

Busy day. And ahhhhh I love the water :)

Today we had our annual family reunion/pool party.  On our way out of town, we stopped so that TJ could complete his 100th Geocache.

Wind farm on our way there...

Logan has been saying for a week that all he was going to do was sit on these steps and splash his feet in the water.  He was on his mark the second we arrived.

He had a very bad experience a couple of years ago where he fell into the pool.  This very pool.  He was being very good and careful (as per his usual), but stuff happens...even with a bunch of adults within arms reach, he managed to fall in.  He still remembers it very vividly and tells everyone about it.  Despite the fact that he seemed just fine after it happened, he is now very fearful of the water.  So, I'm VERY proud of my little guy that he spent most of the afternoon in this inflatable raft, and even spent a good portion in the water with me.  (and I'll have proof of his adventure when you can see the bruising around my neck from him holding on so tight!).  He was IN, and he swam.  He did a tiny bit of floating, a little bit of kicking.  And he was IN!

Avery's first time ever in a pool! She was fantastic - and such a daredevil!  She kept trying to launch herself over the side of the floatie ring and was dunking her own face in. 

Water baby!

Brave man!

Storm that scared everyone home.

Sunset on the way home.

Mission Completion!

That is how Logan announced that the swingset was finished.  Well, there are some finishing touches left to go, but for now, it's good enough to be used.  Logan has been so excited, and then when the time came, my cautious little man climbed the rock wall up to the platform and sat at the top of the slide looking down.  And sat there looking down.  And looked around and called for help!  Eventually, he did go down, but it took some fast-talking on Daddy's part.

New Setup

I got sick and tired of pushing Avery's high chair out of the way 30x an hour.  It's a GREAT highchair, and I love it...but we just don't have the space for it when you factor in 2 adults, 2 kids, and 2 dogs. So we bought a booster seat and she is now sitting at the table beside her big brother...and loving it, I might add.  She has discovered that the dogs will be her friend if she drops bits over the side, and that her brother is always willing to play along with her if it gets him out of eating.

Storms a'brewin'.

I put the kids to bed tonight and when I came downstairs it was extremely dark.  It didn't seem stormy-dark at first, though, just like it was later than I thought or something.  But it was actually stormy-dark.  There was a large, black cloud hovering over our subdivision.  It had a donut hole in the middle and then a scary little section on the side that kept changing really quickly.  I reallllly don't like being the only grown up home when this kind of thing happens.  I was home alone when a tornado struck nearby (I was 12 or 13 at the time) and ever since then, this kind of thing always sends me to the basement to take cover.  Which is difficult to do when I'm weighing the options of waking up 2 sleeping kids and taking cover with them and the dogs, vs. waiting it out a little longer. Turns out the storm wasn't so bad afterall and I didn't have to worry about it for long.

Soccer night, as usual

It was the coach's birthday, so they brought cupcakes! Yummy little treat after running around on the field in this heat & humidity.

Avery is not so content these days.  All she wants to do is go, go, go...and when she can't, she must be fed or all Hell breaks loose!  Here she is trying to escape the stroller.

11 Months

She's on the move and not so happy to be asked to lay still while I took her picture with Piggy! I can't believe that the next entry like this will be the big one...ONE YEAR!!!

Right now, Avery has 5 teeth (2 top centre, 2 bottomcentre, and one top to the right of centre), crawls like a maniac, and is eating table foods (and throwing them across the room) like a pro.

How could you not love this face?

(notice the 4 toofies, too?)

Avery's been eating more table foods than purees lately.  She lives for multi grain cheerios, actually, and will holler at you if she sees you pass over the box in the pantry.  Tonight, we had pasta and mixed veggies with pears for dessert.  I cannot believe how much she can pack away!  (Mind you, some does make it onto the seat of the highchair).  It didn't occur to me to take a before picture of her plate, but there's a part-way pic and an after. Of course, I'm biased, but she's so cute!  Every single bite she takes is followed by an enthusiastic "Mmmm, Ohhh, Mmmm".  If you're in really good standing, she'll even offer to share a few bites ;)

During:  initially, half of the plate was covered in a layer of mixed veggies. Baby pasta is in the bowl on the left and pears on the left side of the plate.

After:  These were only left because they didn't cook very well and were kind of hard & dry.

Hideout

The latest discovery

So once she mastered climbing over things while she crawled, she decided to try out this form of transportation...

I'm guessing she'll be bi-pedal in a week or so?

Papa

Last weekend, the boys went fishin'.  Logan has asked everyday since then when they can go back again.  This weekend was out, because we had a family reunion to attend.  That's OK though, Logan wasted no time wrangling Papa into playing a few rounds of "Sneakers" with him.

Like Father, Like Son

I was outnumbered...

5 kids, one adult.  Luckily it was quiet...even though it didn't work out as I planned with the 3 youngest ones asleep.  They all woke up in a chain reaction of hysterical screaming.  A little snack all around solved everything we ended up with everyone playing very nicely in a confined space.