Welcome to my world

Classic - thanks for the pic Anissa! Why are my kids always lookin' so crazy and hers look calm and collected? I guess they're the spirited children I wanted! No lack of personality here!

Happy 2nd Birthday, Joshua

Happy Birthday, Buddy Boo!

Joshua got to celebrate his second birthday over a period of days as visitors and presents arrived one by one for several days...we were afraid he'd start to think everyday was his birthday. The celebrating began the weekend before his birthday, when Papa, Gigi, Aunt Janelle, and Uncle Jeremy came to visit. Uncle Marc (a new Jacksonvillian) joined us for lunch and cake.

The fire truck from Papa and Gigi is a new favorite toy

Josh is really into choo-choos right now, so I wanted to make a train cake. I was fully prepared for him to not notice the cake at all, but he loved it! For days after, whenever anyone said, "Happy Birthday", Josh's first response was, "Eat...choo-choo...cake."

Joshua got to start out the morning of his actual birthday with a banana split. Daniel fondly remembers doing that growing up, so we're continuing in the tradition.
For dinner that night we had Josh's favorite food - HOT DOGS! (Whenever he's pretend cooking and I ask him what his making it is ALWAYS hot dogs!)
Opening his gift from us - the wrapping paper is Elmo in a fire truck, does it get any better for a 2 year old boy?
The gift is not as cool as it looked in the store, so it will be getting returned for something more worthy. Thankfully he's not really old enough to miss it and has lots of other new toys to play with.

This second year of life has been an eventful one for Joshua - learning to run, gallop, jump, TALK...getting a baby sister...losing a tooth...first stitches...and many more things I'm sure we're forgetting. We love our little guy and delight in how much of a BOY he is...he loves to be outside, make VROOM, VROOM sounds, play trains, get dirty, go to the beach, and explore. There's new challenges now as he begins to assert his own desires (demands?), but we are so blessed by our boy...his sweet kisses, reminders to pray (especially for Gigi), zest for life and all the extra laughs he brings to everyday. What a great 2nd year, BIG boy!

Brielle - 9 1/2 months

On the Move

This is such a fun age! Brielle is sweet, smiley, and on the move! We love getting giggles out of her...and it's easy to do these days. It seems like she's really grown up a lot in the past few weeks.

All Dressed up for MOPS

Brielle's now crawling on her knees rather than her belly, pulling up with ease, and beginning to cruise around the furniture. She also got her first two teeth this month. She's still a good eater and delights in getting table food - most nights she's able to eat what we're eating - baked ziti, black beans and rice, lasagna, chicken casserole. We've gotten good use out of our food mill this time around. Meals can be stressful though as we try to keep everyone's mouths full. Sometimes it's hard for mama to get a bite in here and there. But, now that Brielle's getting some teeth, hopefully she'll be able to eat more finger foods and need less spoon feeding.

Her Pose (especially to flirt with daddy)

Brielle waves and seems to say a form of "Hi" now. She's also started giving the sweetest, wettest kisses ever! I love them and can't get enough. Joshua and "Sis" continue to get along well. She doesn't miss a thing that he does, and they love to chase each other around the house. She giggles when he rubs his hair on her skin. It's sweet to watch them interact. We've seen the first signs of jealousy in Joshua lately - maybe it's him hitting the age of 2 - he wants to be held now when I'm holding Brielle. All in all though he's a terrific big brother and is great with all babies.

Sweet Kisses

Brielle needs less sleep than Josh did at her age. This has its pros and cons. She can go without a morning nap when our day's activities demand it or it can be postponed and she holds up pretty well. This has allowed us the freedom to do some morning activities with Joshua, like walk with friends, library storytime, etc. But, the down side to Brielle needing less sleep is that she's started waking up between 5 and 6 am most days (she goes to bed around 8pm, so not super early). Sometimes in the wee hours, she takes a bottle and goes back to sleep and other days she's up for the day. Dan and I are having a hard time deciding how to handle our early riser - is it just a phase or are we reinforcing the pattern of waking early by feeding her? For right now, to keep my sleepy boys happy, we're going with it, and hoping she'll outgrow it.

Sis is starting to really be interested in toys. She can entertain herself for a long time on the floor. She doesn't really have favorites, just likes turning things over in her hands, shaking them, banging them on the ground, and of course, tasting them. Papa and Gigi brought her a doll this past weekend, so it will be fun to see her learn to play with it.

Loving her dolly from Papa and Gigi

Staycation

The way that Daniel's schedule worked out, he ended up having this past week off without taking vacation. In order to feel like we were taking advantage of it, we planned some fun outings - unfortunately, our camera was apparently on vacation too, not many pictures from this week.

Josh vacationing at home!

First, Dan and I got to go to the last Jags exhibition game and had great seats on the 45 yard line. Such a fun date! The next day he took his new boat out fishing for one of the first times, despite having had it for a few months already. (We've been busy and he's been working like crazy!) Later that afternoon I had the luxury of going shopping ALONE. My bargain hunting friends would be proud - spent $69, saved $197 on 2.5 swimsuits! Not too bad! On Saturday morning we had a good time at the Jacksonville Zoo! Josh learned to say rhino.

Back at home with our wild animals safely in their cage!

(Thanks for the cute outfit mom!)

For Labor Day we ventured to the Okefenokee Swamp in south Georgia. It was about a two hour drive. Once we got there we got to ride a train around the swamp (definitely Josh's highlight), do a little nature walk with alligators, turtles, and an otter, see a program about reptiles, see some black bears (in captivity), and eat very overpriced hot dogs! It was totally worth the drive and hot dog money to hear Josh making his train whistle sound all day long.

Touching a baby gator

The kids decided to take a road trip of their own!

Minnesota

We got to visit my family in Minnesota in August and introduced Brielle to my brother, Marc, for the first time. (Josh has appropriately named him Uncle Haha.) My grandma, Great Aunt Diane, Uncle Joe, Aunt Lori, and their twins, Sofie and Ryan, all came up while we were there too. We were so grateful to be able to see them without having to get in the car again after a somewhat exhausting plane trip up there!

Uncle Haha

Aunt Naenae

Of course, when you go to grandma's you have to get your fill of whipped cream in a can!
Josh is showing Brielle the ropes

Having fun with Great Grandma

Tata has so many fun toys at her house!

We didn't do too much, but just enjoyed being together and getting a break from the Florida humidity. And, the plane ride home went MUCH better than the one getting there, which is good, since on the way up we had vowed to never travel again!

Brielle Update - almost 9 months

Our baby girl is growing up so fast...I keep saying that, but it's true. This year has gone by sooo much faster than the last one - probably because I'm at least twice as busy, probably more! Things are good, but life with two under two definitely has it's challenging moments! I've been thinking that I just need to make it through this first year, but I recently realized that life with a two year old and a one year old is probably more challenging than life with a 1 year old and a newborn - ahhh! I'm continuing to remember that His grace is sufficient for me and His power is made perfect in weakness! (Counting down the days until our adults only cruise in November helps too!)Brielle is on the move now! Since my last update about her, she's started sitting up, eating baby food and some table food, Army crawling, babbling a lot (like she's telling a story), waving bye-bye (couldn't believe it, but she's consistent about it), loving being in the water, and pulling up! CRAZY! We continue to enjoy her easygoing personality, SWEET smiles, resilience to her brother's exuberant attacks and easy laugh, but not to worry, she does have a voice and she knows how to use it. When I went to pick her up in the church nursery this week they said, "She's a sweetie, but she has a little bit of a temper, doesn't she?" Isn't that the truth!

Tata gave her the first taste of baby food - she loved it from the start!

Sweet smiles for Gigi

Love those lil clasped hands

Waving and standing

Perfectly plump bath baby

Crazy Cousins

COUSIN FUN
Not bad for 6 tired kids looking into the sun!

Daniel's sister and her husband and their 4 (soon to be 5) kids came to visit us for a quick overnight in July. The cousins are so sweet, and Joshua loves to spend time with them. The two youngest are close in age to Joshua and Brielle. I had so much fun growing up with cousins my age and look forward to my kids being able to have similar experiences.We're thankful to Jessie for teaching Joshua how to walk and hold hands, he wouldn't do it until she came and walked him all around the house holding her hand.

It looks like they're sizing each other up - I think Brielle might have her, even though she's younger.

Life's a beach!

For quite a while, Josh's pronunciation of 'beach' sounded very much like the other word that can be used in the title of this post! I'm happy to report, he's now saying 'beach' well and we no longer feel the need to repeat after him in public that "Yes, we're going to the bEEEEEch!"

Lookin' pretty comfortable on the surfboard these days!

The outdoor beach 'condo' in St. Augustine

Inside the real condo in St. Augustine

Many fun times have been had at the beach this summer and we're looking forward to more as the warm weather continues, but the sun gets a little less intense! We usually go to the beach just down the street, but we also spent a few days down in St. Augustine with Daniel's family. For my birthday we checked out Mickler's Landing, a popular beach a little ways down the road. And, a few weeks ago some of our friends from Gainesville came to visit and we had a blast catching up with them and enjoying the ocean.

Brielle's 1st time to really get into the sand!
(She's still in the eating-it-by-the-handful stage)

Josh's Haircuts

A Year in the Life of Joshua's Hair
Josh at 8 months - hardly any hair!

One year birthday party - it's starting to fill in!

20 months - got that cool surfer look goin' on

But it started to look like a mullet, so he got a trim...and then a more drastic trim (shown here)

Just having fun with the new 'do!

Buzz cut!

The trimmed hair looked good, but grew out fast, so we decided to try the clippers and he loved it...giggled through the whole haircut. I went through a grieving period after the buzz (I think my mom still hasn't recovered). It took a while to get used to him with no hair, plus he looks like 4 years old now to me, but the more we've had it, the more advantages we thought of - it never looks messed up, it's easy to cut, and it's easier to wash the soap out (not his favorite bath activity)...so, a buzz or modified buzz is here to stay for a while. We're going to try to grow it out a bit on top and hopefully find a happy middle ground, so stay tuned!

**Aren't those pictures of him as a baby crazy? He's growing up too fast...sniffle, sniffle.

Diggin' my 'CHILI' with two spoons

Josh has been a little weird about eating his meals lately (esp. dinner), so we've been experimenting with no snacks, no milk until after dinner, etc - trying to do what we can to make sure he's hungry at mealtime. Last night he refused to eat the yummy leftover green chile chicken enchiladas. We knew he liked them because he'd gobbled them up a few days earlier. We'd prayed for a peaceful dinner, not really believing it possible, but thought of the verse that says "with man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible". There's been quite a racket lately with Josh having fits about eating and Brielle starting to yell whenever she spots that baby food jar - one is upset about having to eat and the other that it's not coming fast enough! (By the way, I've been using our food mill for Brielle lately (thanks, Faye) and she's been loving eating the same food as us...beef stew earlier this week, enchiladas last night, and baked ziti tonight - so weird for her to be sooo big! Dan says, eating comes naturally for her - it's true and it always has!)

Anyway, desperate to eat ourselves and stop the noise, we decided to let Josh get down since once he's decided he's not eating, food tends to start hitting the floor - it's not pretty. Once down, he preceded to pitch a fit, wanting to sit on my lap while I attempted to feed Brielle and myself. So, he got some "crib time", which actually works wonders at calming him down. We put some toys in there and leave the door open and amazingly he quickly calms down and is MUCH happier than he was out in the living area with us. (Last night he made a "choo-choo" out of a Thomas the Train Engine and a truck and rolled it all over the bed and his legs - very cute!) I figured he'd eat later if he was hungry and put his food back in the fridge. Peaceful dinner was achieved - Praise God!

He still wasn't hungry after crib time, so we headed to the park (with his leftovers in the bottom basket of the stroller, just in case). I was determined that if he ate, he would eat what I'd fixed and wasn't taking any excuses! We had fun at the park and met some other nice families - all with big brothers and baby sisters, actually. Still no sign of hunger, so we went home, did baths, put sis to bed, read books...I'm thinking that he's just going to go without dinner...but, as I put him in the crib, he started signing that he was hungry. I was afraid he'd wake up in the middle of the night if I tried to put him down hungry, so out he came and back into the high chair...three happy, peaceful bowls of enchiladas later, he was finally full. (Needless to say, Daniel was pretty surprised when he woke up to get ready for his night shift and Josh was still awake at 8:45pm.)

So, all in all, it was a victory - everyone was happy - and tonight he ate with us, no crib time required - yay!

**I forgot to mention that the reason he has two spoons is that he fed himself with one while I loaded up the other one so it was ready as soon as he was! Pretty smart kid!