Noah's on the move

Click here to see a movie of Noah's latest walking skills.

Heavenly Father's park

We had our sweet friends, the Cornias over for dinner on Sunday (it was awesome if I say so myself-- followed by the best pie I've ever had, courtesy of Reed). After dinner we went for a walk along the bike path near our house. Reed took Bea and Luke off the beaten path and called it a nature walk. Since then we have had nonstop requests for nature walks. We've gone on one every day this week. Last night's was a particular success. We went off the other side of the bike path into a gully that I've always wanted to explore. Luke LOVED it. He talked about it all day today. We told him that these are the kinds of playgrounds Heavenly Father creates. So, all day today he has been erupting into spontaneous prayers thanking Heavenly Father for making such a wonderful park and a beautiful world for us. Amen, little Lukey.

We haven't had Noah in the backpack very much yet. He really enjoyed it. He kicked his legs joyfully and made us feel guilty for not hiking with him more (c'mon this place is five minutes from our house-- we have no excuse).

Here we are playing:

On the way home:This kid was tuckered out, FILTHY and oh so happy.

Luke didn't think Nat had quite enough weight on him. Or, perhaps he thought Nat needed to be balanced out a little.


What treasures are hiding in your neighborhood?

Luke gets a pet

This is the story of Luke's first "real" pet. I say real because he has been telling people for months that he has pets. He just picks one of his stuffed animals and that's his pet. This pet is a little different because it is "real".

Our neighbors have a beautiful fish pond in their backyard that we have admired it for a long time. They have been out of town for most of the month and we have been feeding their fish. Luke was very interested and helped me feed them every time (he did fall in once while we were feeding them). I told him that if he helped me remember to feed the fish we could think about getting our own fish. Well, Luke lived up to his end of the deal and worried constantly about whether the fish had enough to eat. He put a lot of thought into their well being; when it rained he asked me if getting more water would make the fish happy (do fish have emotions?). So, when our neighbors came home from their trip we asked them if we could take one of their fish to live at our house. They agreed and so we rushed over to pick out a bowl and food and then went over to pick out the newest member of our family.

The rest of the story is illustrated.

Here Luke is picking his fish out. He had been thinking of a name for weeks and our friend Whitney suggested Raymond-- it stuck. So here Luke is deciding which fish looks like a Raymond.

Raymond was spotted, caught in a net and then transferred to...

the plastic bag we brought over.

Luke was so happy he could hardly contain himself.

But, he did pause to listen to instructions from Randy, our kind neighbor, about how to care for our addition.

Luke tried to get Noah interested in the fish but Noah just wanted to sample a blade of the jungle we have growing in our backyard (we can't mow the back until things dry out a little more).

We then brought him home and sat his bag in the water until it was all the same temperature.

Then we transferred him into his new home. He looked like he was a lot smaller when he was swimming around in the pond. He looked a little cramped in this first bowl. We had a new one but felt he had gone through enough trauma for the day.
So we gave him dinner,

Luke pointed at him,
Noah reached for him,

Luke stared at him some more,

and then he insisted that he be moved into his room for the night (so he wouldn't be lonely, of course).


This morning we moved him into a slightly bigger bowl and he seems to have a little more swimming space.

Luke is still thrilled about him and talks to him all the time, sings to him, blows him kisses and

hugged him goodnight before heading off to bed.

Dinosaur Hair

This is a picture of our little Triceratops. He really wanted T-Rex hair (notice the T-Rex fingers). But, I think T- Rexes are bald and so Triceratops was the best I could do. In nursery today he made the leader write "Luke T-Rex" on his coloring sheet.

Updates

This week...

It rained A LOT. They are saying that this has been the rainiest month ever.

But, Luke made the best of it by

laughing a lot

playing with his brother,

and posing for pictures.

Noah just slept a lot.

playing in the mud, again

I've been in a blogging rut lately. I am going to blame it on the weather; it has rained constantly for over a week now. The plants are happy about it, the children-- not so much. Mom, as a result of the children's discontent, isn't happy either. We're a little tired of playing inside and ready to enjoy our last days of outdoor play.

Enough griping, these pictures were taken the other evening when we had enough indoor time and decided to go out despite the soggy conditions. Luke found a puddle that he loved. He jumped and ran and swam in the back yard until he was so dirty and cold that I insisted he take a warm bath.


This was how he felt about coming in. Do you see the pumpkins in the backyard? They are taking over-- I love it.

Here are some action shots:

Stomping...

jumping...

swimming...

pretending to be Nacho Libre...

fishing...

and slipping.

Happy end of summer to all of you!

Post Nap Snuggles

It was a good snuggle session when Luke came in and found us after nap time.






Notice the dark circles. Are those ever going to go away?

What a week!

I got in trouble for taking this picture. Nat thought it was cruel to take a picture of our wailing child. He's probably right. But, we can't have all happy pictures can we?

Mostly, this picture represents a week of dealing with some weird virus. It started as a low grade fever, progressed into an awful cough and is finishing up with boogers. Noah sneezed all over his lovey this morning on the way to church. Gross. I think the worst symptom is that they both lost any ability to be left alone for any length of time. The clinginess could have killed me. I spent the whole week carrying around one child or the other while the one not being held cried to be held. Noah only napped if I was holding him. Luke nearly rubbed a bald spot on my head from playing with my hair so much. I am not exaggerating, my scalp hurts. It was not a week for weakling moms around here, no sir.

I think that's the best part of being a mom; realizing how much you are capable of on next to no sleep. Each day this week felt like such and accomplishment. The really wonderful revelation this week was that I really like being a mom, even when it's hard. I also feel endeared to my children on an entirely new level. It was the "I can love you even when you wipe your nose on my face" level (Luke did wipe his nose on my cheek in a moment of extreme sadness-- possibly the grossest thing ever). It may sound sarcastic but, this virus did empower me and help me find out just how much I can handle well. It was more than I thought!

Here's hoping for a less empowering week!

A tender moment

Luke has been sick and sleeping fitfully and so the rest of us haven't slept a lot either. He came down with a terrible cough on Monday and it kept him (and me) up most of the night. Last night was a break through night (thank you, Dimetap) and he slept really well from 8:30PM until 3:00 AM when his cough medicine wore off. I sat up with him and tried to get him back to sleep for a few hours and then gave him some more medicine.
Once I gave him his medicine I took him in on the couch and held him on my chest. He snuggled into me and was quiet for a few minutes. I started to drift off when I felt him stir. I looked down to see him, in the moonlight, looking up at me.
Luke: "Mom,"
Me: "What Lukey?"
Luke: "Does this remind you a little of when I was a baby?"
Me: "Yes, sweetheart"
I then felt his little body snuggle in closer and relax completely. I'd like to think it had a little something to do with feeling secure as well as the medicine taking effect.

I sat there, in my very quiet house, holding my three year old sweetie and felt the significance of what I am doing. I could see, in my mind's eye, mothers across all cultures and generations holding and comforting their coughing little ones in the night and I felt privileged to find myself among them.

Mom and Dad come to visit

We had a whirlwind visit with my wonderful parents this past weekend. Dad was in town on business in the Windy City but commuted back and forth so that he could spend time with us and leave mom here to play.

Here are some of the things that we did:

Dad carried Luke around in his car seat as well as doing many other rowdy things that Luke found thrilling.

Mom and Noah snuggled a lot.

We bought and dressed the boys in matching shirts, again.

Mom and I took Noah to the butterfly exhibit at the botanical gardens. Luke was home napping but I kept wishing that he had come with us.

We rode around in dad's rental car a lot. It has air conditioning and we are still without air in our car.

Mom snuggled Noah some more.

Luke let Dad pour buckets on water on him. See what I mean by rowdy?

Dad let Luke try to throw water at him. Notice the size of bucket Luke has and the size Dad has.

Mom snuggled Luke and read him lots of books.

We also swam a lot in the hotel pool, took the boys to a water park, went to the farmer's market and ate a lot of good food.

It was a good reminder of how much I love my parents and how lucky I am to have come from such wonderful people.

Thanks for a great time, Mom and Dad!