Dads first post on the blog. Alex and I got to play outside on Monday a few times while Luke was napping. The first time he didnt get to dirty and wanted to use his own shovel. Lukes afternoon nap the sun came out and we went back out. He wanted to use my shovel. Then things got messy. He slipped in the mud a few times and started slamming the back of the shovel in the water and mud. He was having a lot of fun.

Alex's 3rd Birthday Party

How many pictures were taken at Alex's birthday party? Over 200! Here are some of my favorites...


We went to the party store to get the supplies for the party and Alex in panic "Don't forget the party hats mommy", oh yes can't forget the party hats


Luke tries out the party hats too


Grandpa got Luke out of bed after he was done napping

3 generation Porter picture

mommy steals a kiss from the birthday boy

hmm, looks a bit like daddy here

mommy and her handsome boy

Uncle Andy, the godfather, always the gives the favorite presents

Luke and his godmother, Bernadette

grandma with Luke watching present opening

grandpa and grandma Ericson (whiskers)

Grandpa Phibbs

Dominic got a lot taller than me

Aunt Veronica

the grandmas

Great Grandma Porter

Great Grandma McDonald

about to sing to the birthday boy

blowing out the candles

very into "reading" the cards

likes this one too

Aunt Theresa came a little later and he got to open another present

big smiles

watch out Grandpa

quickly figured out how to operate it all by himself

so delighted with his new toy

another great toy, with doors and keys

Ten Month Luke

Alex's 3rd Birthday

Alex's birthday was yesterday and as I mentioned we are all pretty sick. So, we cancelled his party and moved it to next weekend. We made cupcakes and opened presents from mom and dad.


Blowing out his candles, minutes later he puked. Alex has always pukes when he has heavy congestion. He goes to cough, gets annoyed that he can't get the stuff out and so he forces harder and then pukes. Yep, it's wonderful.


At least he enjoyed making the cupcakes

Can't Leave Out Luke

Best Pictures from Alex's 2nd year!

It's Alex's birthday tomorrow! Unfortunately he is sick and so are all of us so we had to postpone his party until next week. But, we'll make some cupcakes and get presents from mom and dad tomorrow. Here are some of my favorite pictures from Alex's second year.


the love of all things plugged in


loves to eat fruits and veggies, frozen peas even


became a big brother this year

learned to laugh and play with him, well at least some of the time

lots of smiles jumping around in the playroom, crashing on the pillows

handsome boy, loves to pose for pictures

third Christmas

loves to bake, especially mix flour with a whisk

I think he took this picture of himself

playing with water at Hands On, totally entertained with water

Our Snowman Family

Every week we have a theme that we do special activities with. We do gross motor, fine motor, baking, read stories, etc around a certain theme. It's a great way to make play more interesting and learn new vocabulary words. The previous week's theme was snow and this week's was family. So, this past week we combined the two and made a snowman family. I got the idea from one of the books we checked out from the library called "Snowballs" the illustrations had snowman made of paper with things around the house to make their parts. I thought it would be fun to replicate. Alex's new fun thing is to build things with the use of the glue gun. Don't worry I'm the one using the glue gun, but he likes to direct. We've built a barn with a silo, a truck and this week (heart week) we will be building a heart valentine box. Alex loved making the snowman and kept asking to make more since. I was about to go into the extended family :)

Finally Got Some Teeth

Luke's teeth finally came in. He got the two bottoms in last month and all four top ones came in the past few weeks. Oh, the joys of teething :)

More of Luke at Nine Months

Luke at Nine Months

Luke recently turned nine months. He now weighs 24 1/2 pounds (90th percentile for weight) and is 29 inches (75th percentile for height). Yep, he's a big boy, wearing 18-24 mo. size clothes and barely fitting on the blanket anymore for pictures. We will see if he fits for the next three pictures. He absolutely loves table food and will only eat baby food with some encouragement. He's scooting around a bit, but not quite on all fours cruising around. He's having a bit of difficulty getting that middle off the ground. He's been sleeping through the night for the past couple of months and takes two one hour naps. He's all around an easy baby, just gets fussy around 4 to 6 o'clock hours for whatever reason. He definitely adores his older brother, he's just not the same without him around.