Bath time

Far West Beerfest

9 months

Crawling, standing, laughing, grabbing, snacking. This kid loves real food. He has refused bottles and baby food. Only breastfeeding and whatever is on my plate. He's making delightful babbling noises and starting to recognize some words. He knows who Momma, Dada, Luke, and Lucy are.

Day at the fair with friends

Catch up post....

Its been a busy couple of months. I'm back at work and working more than I'd like (and more than we really need). Juggling both boys, work, keeping house, and making time for my spouse there's not much of me left. I've begrudgingly learned to lower my standards. My house looks like someone threw up toys and dog hair (on a good day), I've stopped couponing, and my hair is in serious need of a dye job. Alan and I have been out together twice in the last 8 months (w/o kids). One of those times was for a Dr. appointment (very romantic). Being a parent is many things but it is definitely not glamorous.

I'm not complaining... I'm tired but happy. Working hard and content. It's a good place and about to get better. Alan was offered a promotion today that is going to give us more time together as a family. I'll cut back my hours at work significantly and will eventually stay home altogether.

*Happy dance*

Besides the hard work... These are the fun things we've been up to:

Luke's Ben 10 cupcakes

We actually had really nice weather so we busted out a slip n slide

Yup... that's my boob. This is how you pick berries and nurse. Round two of nursing has led to a loss of modesty and a chubby happy healthy baby :)

Making jam

Luke was impressed with the tiny jam

Family shot at the zoo

Luke posing as a mighty morphing power ranger. 

Levi learned to crawl.

Threw ZZ and Jordan a Lil' Man baby shower. Duncan Patrick is due this September.

Coed baby showers are fun. This is one of the games... baby bottle chugging (beer in some, cider in others)

Levi sitting in his bumbo destroying a banana and making a big mess.

Brothers at the park.

Aliya's 6th birthday. Unicorn theme. Check out her cake... it's all cupcakes!

Levi's first cake. I'm much less uptight about what foods he gets to eat.

We got Aliya a unicorn mask which lead to lots of creepy pictures.

A month after learning to crawl, Levi decided to start climbing and standing. He'll be walking by October :(

Picked 7 pounds of blueberries for jam, cobbler, syrup, and pancakes.

Levi has been swatted by motors a couple of times now. Hopefully he'll learn his lesson soon.

Luke is my sous chief this canning season. So far we've made strawberry, raspberry, and blueberry lemon jam. Nothing fancy but it should last till next season.

Levi's blueberry face.... such a cutie.

3 months

This cutie is holding up his head, smiling and cooing like crazy. He's really close to laughing too. When I tickle him, he gives me little grunts. Levi does  not like taking a bottle which has been rough on Al. I'm back at work and the boys normally come and visit on my lunch breaks to feed Levi. It's working out but Levi now wants to feed more at night which gives me less sleep. I'm surviving on caffeine and sugar. Good thing he's so cute!

Fire Star Luke

Luke has dubbed himself "Fire Star Luke". He's been doing this for about 6 months now. His friends at school even call him that. It all started with a pair of flame covered slip on vans which make him run extra fast. I made him a flame covered star shirt for Xmas which he wears all the time too. Sometimes he adds other names like ninja or magician to his name as well.

Luke has started writing his name! It's pretty cute. Sometimes the "L" is upsidedown and he likes to add both an upper and lower case "e". He also likes to draw rainbows and fire. For the longest time he would just draw what he called cake makers which were mostly abstract designs. He also now draws faces which ALL have mustaches. Go figure. It's interesting to watch his drawings become more complex.

Luke is a great big brother for the most part. He can be a little rough but what else are big brothers for?