Babies In Baskets!

I know we don't look a lot alike, but I thought it was fun to see a picture of each of us around the same age, doing the same thing : )





I looked through most my pictures of Liam, and of all the thousands we have taken of him, I couldn't find any of him in a basket?! So, thankfully Grandma B took this cute one of him...I'll have to see if we can get a scan of one of Mike too!!

Mr. Phishy

Mike and I have had several Betta fishes in the past, but we haven't had one for many years until now. We thought it might be fun for Liam to have a pet that was cool to watch, relatively low maintenance, and doesn't jump up on him. The dogs were low on food, so Liam and I stopped in at the pet store to get some food, and to pick out a fish. There were so many to choose from, and even ones you couldn't see because there were several rows of them in cups on the shelf. I saw one that kinda looked sick because he kept floating to the side. I told one of the employees, and she said they would take him to the back and keep an eye on him. Liam was very concerned about him, and even a few days later he is asking about the sick one.

He absolutely loves watching his fish. He doesn't lag in the morning because he wants to go watch his fish, and he likes to watch him before bed too. He loves it when we feed him, and he comes up to take a bite of the food. I'm not sure how long the excitement will last, but we are enjoying him enjoying the fish!!

We haven't really picked a name yet. One of the cute names he suggested was 'Dorthy', after Elmo's fish. Mike thought that was really cute since his first fish was name 'Talbot' after Ernie's fish. I suggested 'Thomas', but he said 'No, Thomas is a train'...Anyway, Liam likes to change his name several times a day, and we find it amusing, so he may just have an ever changing name.

Swing Set Is Finally Done!!

And I only say 'Finally' because the weather was finally nice enough this past weekend to work on it. Friday, the night before we finished the swing set, we let Liam do a marathon nap, and we know it's always a gamble when we do. Most of the time he will sleep through the night, but this night he woke up around 11:30 pm, and stayed awake till about 3am! I let Mike sleep in since he stayed up with him, and then he got started on it around 11 am. Liam played on what was done throughout the day, and crashed pretty hard around his nap time. We decided to wake him from his nap, as to not have a repeat of the night before. So in this video he is still waking from his nap, and it took a little coaxing to get him to go down. He finally did and the darn slide was so steep and fast he landed right on his bum, the poor guy. Thankfully, he only cried for a minute or so, but he was ready to go inside after that.

(Play Video below)


Anyway, the next morning we found an old dog bed that has about 6 inches of padding, and we placed that at the bottom of the slide and told him he wouldn't hurt his bum. Thankfully he trusted us, and went down and had a great time!! He slid down that thing so many times that day! We are pretty happy with our purchase, even though it was a pain for Mike to install : )

(Play Video below)

One of the virtues of being very young is...

that you don't let the facts get in the way of your imagination. ~Sam Levenson




Conversation this morning on the way to work:

(Liam saw the big plume of steam where Geneva used to be)

Liam: Mom, look it's the abominable snowman!!!
Me: Wow, it's amazing! (Thinking to myself...did he just say abominable??!! Do 3 yr olds really use that word? I'm pretty sure he got that from 'Frosty the Snowman' movie, but still...pretty amazing vocabulary.)

(As we got closer)

Liam: That's not the abominable snowman, that's a nightmare!

That kid never ceases to amaze me.

The past is not a package one can lay away.

~Emily Dickinson

Ever since we signed up for SmugMug, I have been a lot better about getting our pictures and video's posted. I have been very pleased with their service, and it is so easy to use. One of the best features it has is being able to drag ALL the files at once to their site, and they all upload, there is no finding, attaching etc. It's so fast and easy, I LOVE IT!! Unlimited pictures and video too...I finally had Mike show me how to upload the pics and video from my phone last night...so, there are 62 new videos to see, and 180+ pics!!

Magic Mirrors

Family faces are magic mirrors. Looking at people who belong to us, we see the past, present, and future. ~Gail Lumet Buckley


Family Picture circa 1976 or 1977 (Mom says I'm around 2 here)

April Fools

Mother Nature can be cruel at times, but sometimes she has a silly sense of humor...hence the snow this morning, 'April Fools', 2 days late!! Although it's probably for the best because we are both pretty sore today. My arms have had quite the work out over the last several days....Thursday evening I did 20 min. on the Elliptical (first time in many months), Friday I spent 2+ hrs. cleaning our stove top (that had baked on grease) and then took the kids for a walk in their stroller up some pretty steep hills, and Saturday I raked the dead grass out of part of the lawn, then helped Mike carry the club house part (left part of set, see below) from the garage to the back yard! Needless to say we both need a break today. I forgive Mother Nature for the snow too, since this storm saved us from a minor disaster last night. As I was leaving to get take out last night, the wind blew the door to our house in the garage open. I got out of the car, and for some strange reason I went behind the car, and saw a box of parts for the set right behind my tires! Had the wind not blown the door open, I would have run over it!! So glad I didn't, that would have been a spendy mistake...it had the swings, and other parts in it. Anyway, we all got to enjoy a short swing before the storm got too bad. Below are some cute pics of the kids. Before the storm blew in last night.

I should have got a before picture, but imagine it looking pretty black around the burners :)
When we ordered the swing set, it said 2-3 weeks for delivery. We got a call from the delivery company the next day that it was ready! Now that is fast service.



First walk of the year 4/1/11


I love this picture of Liam looking back and Gretchen peeing in the background!




Love the crazy look on his face here!
Happy Swinging!!