Everyday Moments

holiday/winter catch up

2012-01-18T17:35:00.000-08:00

Okay, time for a catch up. Here's what's been going on these past few months:

It seems like forever ago but in October we took the boys to a local pumpkin patch. They loved the kiddie hay maze, jumping in the huge hay pit and playing in the dried corn box. Cole had fun picking out our pumpkins. We ended up leaving with four good sized pumpkins for carving and two littler ones for painting.

Running around in the patch

our masterpieces

Then came Halloween. Cole went back and forth on his costume. First it was a bat, then a ghost and finally a...

zoo keeper

with Blake as his little tiger

and Nick was his not so little gorilla.

Christmas came and the boys got way too many presents and gave me way too few good pictures, typical.

And after a uneventful January, we got a bunch of snow and the boys had fun romping around.

Hard at work building a fort.

The End!

the birthday boy

2011-10-24T13:43:00.000-07:00

My little boy is 4!

Crazy, right?

This year I was able to get some really cute "birthday pics". Here are a few more from that photoshoot.

Cole's birthday was on a Sunday so we waited until Monday (Nick's day off) to celebrate it. The night before I used a mini helium tank to blow up a bunch of balloons and put them all over his ceiling so that he would see them when he woke up. We also had a cake and presents that he got to open around lunch time.

One of his presents was this cute tool kit, he loved it.

For dinner, we went to Cole's favorite restaurant, Rainforest Cafe.

He got to get this really cool souvenir glass.

And some new binoculars. He loved checking out all the fish.

Plus, they brought him the volcano cake and sang "Happy Birthday" to him. He was really excited by the sparkler.

And that was our day. Cole thanked me for "his birthday" about a million times so I'm pretty sure it was a success.

Today, we are headed to the pumpkin patch and I'm hoping to get some good pictures!

california trip part 2: Disneyland

2011-10-17T16:30:00.000-07:00

I'm back with Disneyland pictures! We ended up spending 3 days in Disney which was about all we could handle. I only brought my camera once because I didn't want to tote it around but we did end up using the Disney photo pass service which was basically photographers stationed all over the park taking pictures for you and Nick has a pretty decent camera on his cell phone. So these pictures are all a mix of the three.

The first thing we did in Disneyland was grab a churro. Yum!

Nick also had this gigantic ice cream cone later in the day. It was so big that it started melting all over the place before he could finish it. I'm not going to lie, it was hilarious!

Cole loved the parade, he was dazzled!

Blake was more interested in the crowd than the parade.

The nice thing about using the photo pass is that we were able to get a lot of family photos!

Cole loved this part!

Cole rode on is very first roller coaster. He was so excited about it and did really well. Afterwards he told me that it was really fun "but... it was little too fast." haha

That's us in the front car!

Blake was a pill at Disneyland but he was usually happy when he was able to explore and be out of the stroller.

Cole's favorite ride was the carousel, we went on that one multiple times throughout the trip.

He also was a fan of bug world and any sort of flying ride. He DEFINITELY did not like any type of ride that was dark or scary. We went on the Roger Rabbit ride (my idea) and he was thoroughly traumatized.

But he was brave enough to take a couple character shots which is a big deal! He even let Mickey touch him!

Although notice how far from Pluto he had to stand.

And on our last day in Disneyland, it was 100 degrees! Luckily we had gotten a babysitter for Blake so Cole was able to take advantage of the stroller. He was definitely hot and tired by the end of the day

Coming up next... birthday pics!

california trip part 1: the non-disneyland stuff

2011-10-10T13:34:00.000-07:00

I am finally getting around to posting pictures from our California vacation. I was updating a bunch of software on my computer when we first got home and then I just haven't gotten around to posting. Luckily my house is a disaster right now and I am trying to find any excuse to put off cleaning it so here I am, haha!

We had to get up so early to get to the airport. Cole was a little confused about having to wake up when it was still dark. Here he is at around 3AM, too sleepy to open his eyes but still excited to go to Disneyland.

We had a little time to spare at the airport but luckily they have this great play area that kept the kids busy.

Cole had his own little carry-on to roll around.

When we got into Anaheim we still had hours until we could check in to our hotel. I was super cranky from lack of sleep and we needed the boys to nap so Nick took control and went where he wanted. That's how we ended up at the Coliseum and Rose Bowl. The W is for Washington Huskies, not some random gang sign.

Other than Disneyland, we also went to Sea World. Cole loved the sky tram ride. He loved the dolphin and Shamu show too, although he wasn't too happy when we went and sat in the splash zone. Luckily we were high up in the splash zone so we never got wet.

This picture sums up how Blake felt about all of our outings. He was pretty cranky the whole time, with the exception of the times he got to run around and interact with other people. He is definitely a social boy!

A few family shots from Sea World:

We also spent a day at Seal Beach.

Blake was fearless and loved running off towards the water.

Cole on the other hand preferred playing in the sand and building sand castles with daddy.

Blake had fun with the sand too.

And, of course, we had to plan a visit to the San Diego zoo. I love this picture. I'm not sure what they are doing but I think they are pretending to be elephants!

Another favorite photo of these two!

Cole was really looking forward to the bug house. We spent a lot of our time at the zoo in this one little building.

More than anything else, Cole was looking forward to the dung beetle. For weeks he had been going on and on about getting to see a dung beetle at the zoo. The dung beetles are kept over by the Elephant so we had to make a special trip way out there to see them.

We took a trip to the zoo back when Cole was just a little over 1 years old. Here he is trying his hardest to look over this fence.

And here he is at the same fence almost 3 years later!

That's all of our non-Disneyland pictures. I will post the Disneyland pictures soon!!

summer days and getting ready for Disney.

2011-08-26T13:38:00.001-07:00

Hey all, just wanted to post a few favorite photos from the past few weeks so that I am all caught up before we go on vacation. We're getting ready to go to California for a week with the boys. We're planning on hitting up Disneyland, Seaworld, San Diego Zoo and the beach of course. I don't know who's more excited Cole or Nick and I!

Now onto the photos...

First here is a picture of Lola and Cole running around. The Bonecks came to see us for the weekend and these two were so cute together. They were in their own little imaginary world the entire time!

It's been super hot here (well for Seattle anyways)! We've been spending a lot of time out back in order to escape the stifling heat inside. Not having A/C sucks!

Blake loves being outside and running around with his brother.

Cole loves finding bugs.

Cole Parker, Bug Hunter.

Blake loves his little slide that Grandma got him for his birthday! I love that smile!

That's it. I'm off to go start packing for our trip! Be on the lookout for some vacation pics soon!

a mini vacation, a bare bum and slugs getting freaky

2011-08-01T13:50:00.001-07:00

Nick took a week off of work and we decided to head to Kennewick. It was nice to see our families and to enjoy some real summer weather!

We spent a lot of time playing in Grandma's backyard. These two are so cute together!

His big brother is always able to get a smile from this little guy.

A little self promotion... shameless I know.

Blake has become very mobile. He loves running around and chasing his brother.

Which usually results in this.

We also spent some time at a few local parks. Mr. Monkey here just hanging out.

Blake LOVES the slides. He's totally fearless too. All you have to do is set him at the top of a slide and he will lean himself forward and slide down. Then he turns around and tries to climb back up.

There were a lot of splash parks in Kennewick. Cole was kind of a baby and never actually got wet in any of them.

Poor baby ended up being in the wrong place and the wrong time when the water randomly turned on. Nick had to run in and save him, I mean Hello, I had the camera!

And best of all, we spent a few days at Grandma's pool. Cole was a wimp at first and would only go in like this.

Mr. Fearless here would just run straight into the pool. Over and over. We had to keep a very close eye on him.

Daddy doing double duty.

Finally we showed Cole that he could stand up in the shallow end and he started being a little braver.

By the end of the day, he didn't want to leave. I think it's time for some swimming lessons. Well, after he figures out the whole potty thing.

And that was our trip to Kennewick!

Now just a couple little bonus pictures.

You should sing this song in your head while viewing this photo:

"Cuz I'm freeeeeeeeee, free falling" - Tom Petty

And as you've heard we have a few pet slugs. 4 of them actually. The other night I went to shut off the light it Cole's play room and noticed that there was something weird going on in their tank. Yep, that's right the slugs were getting their groove on. Slugs mating is definitely one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen. The big white thing in between them is their genitalia sticking out of their bodies. Weird, I know. And you're welcome for this image, now it will be forever ingrained in your mind, as it is in mine.

P.S. They were at it again a few nights later. They share their cage with 2 other slugs... um awkward... get a room you two, or at least a rock.

our 4th of july

2011-07-07T13:49:00.000-07:00

This is how we spent our day...

Headed to "Family Fourth" at the downtown Bellevue park. After 30 mins Cole decided that he was "tired of all of this" and Blake ended up screaming in his stroller the entire 15 min walk back to the car. We decided to skip the big firework show that night and bought our own fireworks instead.

I got a few shots of this little cutie enjoying his favorite treat, a popsicle.

Cole was actually excited for fireworks! Which was nice, since last year he spent the whole night hiding under a blanket in the house.

He still wasn't too sure about the loud ones.

But loved the sparklers.

And Mr. Cranky Pants here got to sit in his throne on the porch and watch the fireworks while eating some snacks. He was fascinated by the lights and sounds but eventually got too cranky for it all and went to bed.

By the time it was dark, it sounded like a war zone in our neighborhood. Pretty much all fireworks are legal in Lynnwood so we had about 5-6 big firework shows going off all around us. Once we were done with ours, we just sat on our front porch and watched all of the others. Cole really got into the fireworks this year and insisted we all clap after each one. The older these boys get, the more fun stuff like this becomes!

And that was our day. Hope everyone else had a nice 4th of July as well!

photoshoot fail

2011-07-01T13:38:00.000-07:00

Lessons learned today:

- If you think it's going to be too bright for pictures, it's going to be too bright for pictures. Especially if you have two incredibly pale little boys who just reflect that light right back at the camera.

- A nice camera cannot work miracles. Well it can work small miracles, but not big ones. And you might as well forget about it if you are too busy to "deal with manual" and you have to pop it into Auto.

- Taking pictures of two wiggly boys is always easier with two people. A.L.W.A.Y.S.

- Attempting a photo shoot right before Blake's nap time is not a good idea. Neither is attempting a photo shoot any time of the day while Blake is teething.

I follow a lot of photography blogs and every once in a while a photographer will post some amazing shots of their children. Then if they are feeling nice, the next day they will post a few of the "bad" shots. You know the shots where the kids are being crazy, and refusing to look at the camera. It helps us novices feel a little better about our attempts at photography. This is going to be kind of like one of those posts except without the post of amazing shots first. Because I took 190 pictures at the park today and came home 0 for 190.

I didn't even both to edit these because it wasn't worth it. Even now they crack me up and I'm sure in the future I will still find them amusing...

We went to a local park that had this huge "climbing" rock that I thought would make a nice backdrop. As you can see they boys were more interested in climbing than having their picture taken.

Is this some sort of celestial angel? Nope, just Cole. Check out the glow.

More glow and I can't seem to keep that kid away from his brother's hair.

I then decided to move over to a bench in the shade because of the glow. Unfortunately Blake was only interested in finding a way off the bench.

I love this one of Cole. Too bad he has a chubby little fist on his neck.

Finally, they are both looking at the camera. Although my centering is WAY off and they don't look too amused by my antics to make them smile.

Awww, hugs are always cute. Not quite what I was hoping for but still cute.

Then, I found a spot on the rock that I had at first dismissed because it was pretty shady. After a few tests shots, I wish I would have gone there first. By this time Blake was ready for a nap and sick of the whole thing. Cole had already run off with some random little girl to go play. And I was getting a little self conscious in case anyone happened to be around to hear me. Because there was a lot of "Cole sit down" "Cole get back over here and sit down." "Cole look at the camera" " Cole sit down and smile" "Cole SMILE", if anyone was around to hear me they probably thought I was a little crazy!

But the trip wasn't a complete bust because we did get to do a little of this.

Just to reiterate.. these are the "good" (but not really so good) shots. You don't want to see the bad ones!

I have some older photos to post soon and we have fun 4th of July plans at the Downtown Bellevue park. Hopefully I will get some better shots with Nick around to help. Have a fun weekend!!

our first camping trip

2011-06-30T17:09:00.000-07:00

A few weekends ago, I suggested to Nick that we take the boys camping for a night. Yes, it was actually my idea, shocking I know! Even though I hate (and I mean HATE) camping now, as a kid we use to go camping all the time and I really want the boys to have that experience. Which means I will have to suffer through it, well at least until they're scouts and then I'm done!

After looking at a few places online, I booked us for one night at Kayak Point Park. Although the camping trip was mostly a success, I think we will wait until next summer to attempt it again. Cole had a blast but Blake is not at a good age for camping. Something about a little boy crawling through the dirt and mud, picking up every rock or stick he finds and trying to eat it, and making a b-line to the fire every chance he got, well it's just not much fun! That's not even counting being in the same tent as him and having to let him "scream it out" for 15 min at 1 AM before he will finally go to sleep. I am excited for a time when both boys are a little older and they can both run around and get messy and do boy thing, LOL!

Mr. Messy himself... that bottle got so disgusting and dirty!

Cole was so excited to roast things on the fire. As soon as we started setting up camp, he found his little chair and the roasting sticks and then sat in front of the fire pit demanding a fire. When we finally did get a fire going, he roasted 4 hotdogs (ate less than half of each) and a bunch of s'mores. It was his favorite part of the trip.

Blake was happiest while he was eating, surprise surprise.

Before going to bed, I told Nick that we needed to take our garbage to the dumpster so an animal wouldn't get into it overnight. He rolled his eyes and said we didn't need to. I went to brush my teeth and when I came back to the site I saw Nick and Cole sitting by the fire with the flashlight lighting up the trees and wouldn't you know it, there was a raccoon getting into our garbage!

It was okay though because Cole loved it!

In the morning, it was pretty cold so Blake and I hung out in the tent for awhile while Nick cooked breakfast. Blake had about 5 layers of clothing on so he was probably the warmest out of all of us.

Then we went on a hike. Nick had gone down the trail while we were all sleeping and told Cole that he had seen a couple huge slugs. Cole is obsessed with slugs, so he was so excited to find them.

Before finding any slugs, he found this snail. He picked it up and wanted to take it home. I told him we could but he would have to carry it until we got back to the site. He ended up carrying that thing for almost an hour! On the way back to the site he found some big slugs and carried one of those back to the site too. It was really hard and disgusting trying to get all that slime off of his hands.

And yes, now we have a pet slug and snail. Sluggy and Snaily (Cole is reallllllly inventive with names, huh?). Actually we only have Sluggy because Snaily was kind of a drama queen. It kept going into hibernation if everything wasn't just right (the temp, the moisture, the food). I don't want to put THAT much effort into these "pets" and who wants a snail that never comes out of it's shell? I convinced Cole to let it go. It was a little heartbreaking because as the snail was *slowly* crawling away , Cole whispered "I love you so so so much snaily." I almost let him take it back at that point, but I had already told him that if we kept it, it would die soooo I didn't want to confuse the kid.

Summer is here!

2011-06-17T22:07:00.000-07:00

Here's how we've been spending our days...

We've finally had some nice weather which means time spent outside in the backyard!

This is one of the dangers of trying to photograph the wild animal that is Cole, you always have to be ready for attacks:

We busted out the basic summer play things.

Mommy and Cole had a night at the zoo together.

and got to experience this.

We checked out the Japanese Gardens with our budding photog.

I wish I had someone to lift me up to catch that perfect shot!

Cole fed the fish.

and this cutie pointed them all out to us.

Here's an attempt at a cute family picture. Oh well, close enough!

and Daddy took this sweet little shot with his cell phone after he and Cole spent the night in our tent out back to get ready for a camping trip.

And there you go! I have some camping pictures to post so be on the lookout for those! :)

The Birthday Party!

2011-06-10T23:39:00.001-07:00

Oops! I've gotten a little behind on my blogging, again! Well, the good news is that we are still doing our thing and I have been taking plenty pictures of it all.

A few weeks ago we went over to Kennewick to have a joint birthday party for Blake and my niece Charlie, who is 5 days older than Blake. Here are the photos:

Some sweet little hugs from a sweet little girl:

Let's get this party started!

They were both pretty happy about all the attention they were getting!

"happy birthday to you..."

They both were pretty mad when they had to wait for the cake to be cut!

Yummy!

Messy, messy babies!

The party was supposed to be in the park but it was "supposed" to be a nice day and instead was super windy so we relocated to my parents' house for the presents and cake. Both babies were pretty worn out by the end of it, even the sugar from the cake wasn't enough to keep them going!

I have some catching up to do so I will post again soon! We are going camping for one night this weekend and Nick and Cole are sleeping in the tent out back tonight as practice. Cole was so excited about it, it was really cute! :)

My baby turns 1!

2011-05-18T14:58:00.001-07:00

I can't believe that my little boy is 1! Crazy!!

Blake's life thus far in pictures:

And today I did a mini birthday shoot, here are some of my favs! :)

Blake is definitely a happy little boy. He loves to laugh and finds everything amusing. The only time he is cranky is when he is hungry (he loves to eat!) or tired (he sleeps almost as much as he eats!). He loves playing with his brother and cuddling up with us. The cutest thing about Blake is that if you lay down on the floor, he gets so excited and crawls over to lay down next to you and cuddle! He totally has his own personality and we are so lucky to have him in our family!

In The Life of Cole: Muscles, Bugs, Soccer and Mommy School.

2011-05-17T15:15:00.000-07:00

Showing off these:

Caught some of these:

Yuck! Grubs!

Played a little of this with Mom:

And after coming to the conclusion that there is no way we will be able to afford 2 years of Preschool, and at $150+/month, we may not even do one year of preschool, I've decided to start "Mommy School". I'll do a mini lesson 1-2 times a week during Blake's nap time. Today was "A is for Alligator", we read some Alligator themed books, finger painted and practiced tracing the letter A with our fingers. Sang some songs, colored a picture and traced the letter A with a marker. Made an Alligator craft and watched an alligator episode of Charlie and Lola.

Here's a few shots from our day, Cole loved it and keeps asking me if we can have some more "Mommy School"

P.S. Cole just now told me "Mom, I didn't think Mommy School was going to be fun but it was fun." ummm, I'm happy that you had fun but thanks a lot for the vote of confidence! LOL

A quick guest appearance by this little cutie, doing his favorite thing:

This little one turns 1 tomorrow!! I can't believe how fast that went!

Our day at the Zoo...

2011-05-10T10:59:00.000-07:00

He was afraid of these:

But was thrilled to see these:

He was just happy to be along for the ride:

And when he got sick of the stroller, he got his first shoulder ride:

We posed with a few of these:

And look who finally has some teeth, two bottom ones and one top front that you can just barely see in this picture. That one makes him look kind of like an old prospector:

And that was our day. :)

Here's what's been going on over here...

2011-05-09T12:50:00.000-07:00

Someone is taking his first steps:

There's been plenty of this:

Someone is growing up:

We've spent some time out here:

We colored some of these:

The Easter bunny made a visit:

We took some Easter pictures:
(I love these boys!!)

Blake's been doing plenty of this:

And getting plenty of these:

Speaking of Blake, check out these curls!

And today, Cole showed just what a boy he is by holding this little frog that Nick found in the yard. Meanwhile I freaked out a little every time it jumped out of his hand! I did not want that thing landing on me!

And that's life! Hopefully I will find more time to fit in some blogging!

Our February!

2011-03-01T12:15:00.000-08:00

I'm back with what seems to be my monthly blog post! I keep meaning to post more often but never seem to get to it. February 4th was Nick's birthday so we had a mini little birthday celebration for him. I helped Cole make a couple little popsicle stick frames and he helped me make a birthday cake and signs. He had a lot of fun frosting the cake and putting all the candles on.

We made a bunch of little signs and one HUGE one to hang accross the mantle. I wrote the letters out and Cole colored (or scribbled) them in. He was super excited about it and made me keep it up for days!

After awhile he got sick of pictures!

We didn't do anything huge for Nick's birthday but I did take the boys to meet him for lunch at Red Robin and I think he was happy with our surprise birthday cake and homemade presents.

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In other news, Blake is getting so big. He crawls around everywhere and is now pulling himself up and cruising along the couch. He is also sticking EVERYTHING he finds in his mouth. He just puts random stuff in there and plays around with it until I notice and have to dig it out. In this picture you can see the wad of painters tape he somehow found. I didn't even notice it in there until after I took the picture!

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Cole has become obsessed with dinosaurs. He has a dinosaur book that he loves to read, he loves watching the show "Dino Dan" and he always wants to pretend that we are dinosaurs. Soooo, I thought it would be fun idea to take him to the Pacific Science Center to check out their cool dinosaur exhibit. Right now the first Monday of every month is free admission. Well, it's a good thing we got in for free, otherwise it would have been a waste of money! Cole was terrified of the dinosaurs and refused to stay in there.

You can see the fear on his face!!

Finally, he noticed these little toy dinosaur displays and was a lot more comfortable with that.

Luckily, there was a lot of other stuff to do in the museum so we still ended up having fun. He keeps asking to go see the dinosaurs again and he swears that he won't be too scared this time but I think I might wait until he is a little older!!

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Well, it's happened! Cole discover Mcdonald's ice cream! Now everytime we go there for a playdate, he starts begging for "the white swirly ice cream". I usually go through the drive thru on our way out and get him one (unless he hit too many kids while inside, lol!). It's so messy but he loves it!

Another cute thing about Cole, if you ask him what he wants to be when he grows up he will tell you he wants to be a "police officer, so I can blow my whistle, tell the cars to stop and then tell them where to go" ummm ok.

Here he is blowing his pretend whistle!

Cole also LOVES to go into Blake's room, climb into his crib and wake him up! I don't mind unless it's super early in the morning and about 2 hours before Blake usually wakes up. Yeah, then I get a bit cranky about it. Still, it's sweet to see how much Cole loves his little brother!

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So, ever since getting my new camera, I've noticed that the flash makes both my boys close their eyes. It was getting so frustrating. After doing some research, I figured out that the best thing to do would be to buy a better lens so I wouldn't need the flash! Nick hates shadows in photos so it was relatively easy to talk him into it.

We went to Bellevue Square to buy the lens and then took Cole and Blake to the big play area at the mall. They loved it and it gave me a chance to test out the new lens.

And basically I love my new lens!! <3>

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And that's pretty much it! We're getting ready for a somewhat hectic month. Nick is headed to Dallas for a week long training so I will be headed to Kennewick and Spokane with the kids to visit family. And then a few days after getting home from that I fly to Spokane (sans kids) to spend sometime with my sister. Nick is staying home with the kids but I'm not sure he knows what he's getting himself into, LOL! We'll see!

January 2011

2011-02-03T16:14:00.000-08:00

So I was planning on blogging weekly but it seems like it might end up being monthly!! LOL

January was somewhat eventful for us. Nick started a new job! He is still with AT&T but he is now managing the Bellevue Square retail store. He is enjoying being back in a store but I have to admit that so far the new hours have been hard for me! LOL I liked how flexible his schedule was before!

My birthday was this month and I turned 28! Yikes, only two more years until I turn 30 which is going to be sooooo trippy! I still remember my mom's 30th birthday party so it will be really weird when I am turning 30. My sister flew into town for a my birthday and brought her adorable daughter Charlie. It was a lot of fun having her here!!! I'm already planning my trip to go see her. It really sucks that we live so far away from each other.

OH, and I got my camera!! A Nikon D310o. I am soooo excited but I still need to figure out how to work all of the settings!

Okay, enough chit chat... here's our month in photos:

A fun little firecracker craft we did for New Years Eve!

I cut up some paper confetti for Cole to throw at midnight. He loved it!

And of course we needed some sparkling cider!

Such a happy baby in his jumper!

Cole started sunbeams this year! So far he is doing okay... I teach the 5 year olds so I am in sharing time at the same time as him. This is good because I am able to step in when he starts hitting one of the other kids, lol! Although sometime I wish I wasn't in there at the same time because I am sure they would figure it out without me and then I wouldn't have to worry about it! The funny thing is that he refuses to sing because it's "too loud." One Sunday they passed out bells for the kids to shake during the song and he held his quietly because he didn't like all of the noise! Silly kid! He doesn't mind being WAY too loud at home!

This is what he gives me when I try to get a "nice" picture of him in church clothes!

Cole loves his little brother and the feeling is mutual. Unfortunately he might love him a bit too much and Blake ends up getting laid on a lot!

So, I probably shouldn't be admitting this but yes, Cole is wearing Christmas pajama bottoms with his Thanksgiving shirt... in January. That's just how we roll...

Blake is eating solids now and has turned into a little oinker. I was having a little difficulty feeding him hence the sweet potato mess all the way up to his eye!

Proof that Blake thinks it's hilarious when Cole roughs him up. The kid has no sense of self preservation!

Blake and Charlie hanging out! This is Blake's favorite pose because he can't see to get himself up in a sitting position!

Before the babies were born my mom got these little kitty cat hats for them in CA. We did a little photo shoot of the kids wearing them! It was super cute, they were so fascinated with them! This is my fav photo of Blake.

To see more photos of Erin's trip visit check out her blog: http://kylenerin.blogspot.com

Such a handsome boy!

Hugs! Blake is zoning out because of the TV, lol!

MAJOR meltdown! These have become an almost daily occurrence! He was soooo mad that I was taking pictures! hehe!

I took Cole to Target with me and let him pick out a shirt. This is what we ended up with. Ummm, okaaaaaay?

Blake is crawling all over the place! His favorite thing is to crawl through the TV dinner tables. He usually gets stuck or knocks over the table which means we have been putting them away a lot more lately!

This boy loves to laugh! Seriously how cute is he!!??!!

That's it for January now onto February! Nick's birthday is in a few days, he's going to be 32... oldie!! :P

In other news, my sister and I are reading a list of books from "1001 books you have to read before you die." Right now we are reading all of the books from the 1800's which is going to take us a few years considering it is 150 books! Here's a blog where we are documenting the challenge, if we can keep up with the blogging that is! http://booksmysisterreads.blogspot.com

Final Post of 2010 - December!!

2010-12-30T18:33:00.000-08:00

And here's our December...

This baby is so ready to crawl! He does this little bridge move but can't quite get moving!

You do not want to get on his bad side!

We finally got our Christmas tree. We decided to go easy this year and just buy a fake one. Cole had so much fun decorating it!

Someone has graduated to the big boy bath.

Cole loves watching 'toons and playing games on his iPhone.

We went to Kennewick for Christmas. It was so nice to be around family for the holidays!

Blake & Grandma Parker

Nick came home from basketball on Christmas Eve morning and started throwing up! He went to bed and next thing you know, both boys were throwing up in the living room. Yeah, it was not a very fun day! Nick is usually the one who deals with the kids when they are throwing up because I can't stand it. With him being sick I was somewhat on my own and freaking out! LOL Thank goodness for Nick's family who helped me out during the whole ordeal. I prayed and prayed that the boys would all be better by Christmas morning and that I would somehow not be sick on Christmas day (everyone else was sick within 24 hours of being exposed to the bug.) My prayers were definitely answered! All three of them were better on Christmas morning and I didn't end up getting sick until Monday!

My poor sick little boy!

Christmas Day:

This is the look on Cole's face when he first saw all of his presents! Seriously priceless!!

Cole had asked Santa for a T-Rex Dino and was so excited to find one waiting for him in the morning!

This kid is smitten with his new dino!

Opening presents with daddy!

He's rich! ;)

Cole helping Blake open his presents.

Silly boys in their matching PJ's!

Mommy and Blakie opening presents.

We really wanted a photo of all three kids in front of my parent's tree but this was the best we could get. It was such a pain in the butt because Cole kept doing this:

Sorry Blake!

and people in the background kept distracting the kids and doing this:

thanks a lot dad!

Both of these babies are so close to crawling! I can't wait until they can play together. Blake had a minor wardrobe malfunction, hence the nakedness!

Our Christmas card! Merry Christmas 2010!

Okay, that's it for 2010! Onto 2011, hopefully I can be a little more regular in my blogging this year! *fingers crossed*

Playing Catch-Up - November

2010-12-30T17:00:00.000-08:00

So I am majorly behind in my blogging! In the spirit of the new year, I am going to post all of my November and December pictures before tomorrow so that I can start fresh on the 1st. I really want to try to blog once a week in 2011!

Here's what went on in November:

Say hello to my chunky little boy!

Blake still hasn't figured out how to sit up on his own but we're working on it! Such a happy baby!

I've been trying to do little projects with Cole, to help channel some of his crazy energy. We made some corn starch slime and he LOVED it! Which is somewhat surprising considering he usually hates getting messy.

He is just so dang cute!!

We bought a year membership to the children's museum for Cole's birthday! He loves it there, this is the water exhibit which is one of his favs.

My two boys! Yes, Cole was in desperate need of a hair cut and he had a black eye. Not sure how he got it, all I know is that it was there when I picked him up from church nursery on Sunday.

We got snow and Cole loved it! 'Nuff said!

Finally broke out the highchair for Blake. Seriously, will you look at the size of this kid's wrists!!

So Thanksgiving was a little different this year. We ended up being stuck at home because of some bad weather. I was really disappointed about not being able to make it to my parent's house! I pouted, ALOT! In the end, we went to Claim Jumpers for dinner, and then took to boys to see "MegaMind". It really wasn't as bad as I thought it would be!

Cole is a cute little Thanksgiving shirt.

Both the boys in their shirts. It has gotten so hard to get a good pic of these two!

Mommy and Cole at dinner.

Nick with the boys at dinner. This picture cracks me up because it really shows what going out with two young kids looks like! LOL

Okay, coming soon... December! ;)

Ho Ho Ho!

2010-12-21T23:47:00.000-08:00

I obviously have like a bazillion catch up pictures to post but for now I just wanted to post this years photo with Santa...

Merry Christmas!!

You know you're a bad blogger when...

2010-11-02T16:26:00.000-07:00

You go over a month without posting!! Yikes! I am forever going to be haunted by the missing October 2010 in my Blog Archive! LOL

So, the good news is that although my blogging had come to somewhat of a halt, life continued on and I have a ton of pictures to post! I'm going to skip the pictures from our Coast trip because that's a little overwhelming right now and instead get back to our everyday kind of stuff. We had two major events in October, Cole's birthday and Halloween. Oh, and our 8th year anniversary but that kind of takes a back seat to Cole's birthday these days.... sad! lol

And now, without further ado... here are the photos:

Here is proof that Cole is not as big of baby as his mom. He loves playing with Kyle and Erin's two dogs. He runs around the backyard with them and shouts directions at them. Mostly they just ignore him!

We were trying to get a picture of Kyle with the two babies, and Cole decided to peek his little head around and sneak into the shot. This photo cracks me up! I mean, how cute is that little face!?!

We took the boys to a Mariner's game. It was a disaster with both of them and we ended up leaving early but oh well, the tickets were free.

This boy loves to play and be silly!

I just can't believe how big my little baby is getting. He still seems so brand new to me and I really feel like I am still trying to figure out this whole two kids thing. Blake loves being on his tummy and rolling around. I really have to make sure that there aren't any of Cole's toys around him because he will roll his way over to them to put them in his mouth!

We also busted out the jumper for him and as you can see he loves it!

This is Cole and his "Patrick" who just so happens to be a girl. Don't ask me why, but Cole insists that Patrick is a girl and refers to it as "she" and "her". Silly kid!

And now.... the birthday!

My big boy is 3! It's crazy how big he is getting. He loves to read books and play pretend. He has a huge imagination. He has an invisible dog named Sparky, he pretends the couch is boat and sails it to Kennewick, he runs races around our house and declares himself the winner and asks me for a gold medal. He loves making up stories and coloring pictures (which mainly consist of snakes because he can draw a pretty mean straight line). His favorite color is blue and he likes to remind me daily. He is such a chatter and comes up with the funniest things. He loves to cuddle his mommy, play with his daddy, and kiss on his brother! He seriously is so much fun to have around, even on his worst days!

Cole woke up on his birthday with a room for of balloons and a brand new play room full of presents! He loved opening his presents, of course!

My parents bought Cole a train table. We set it up the night before and covered it with a sheet. Surprisingly he didn't even notice the sheet in the morning and so we were able to wait until my parents got in town to reveal it. It's pretty sweet when it's all set up, but of course Cole would rather have the tracks on the floor and all the pieces lined up on the futon soooo I've stowed away a lot of the pieces for now and the table is usually bare. lol

We also had a little birthday party for him in Kennewick the following weekend:

Blowing out his birthday candles!

Erin came to Kennewick for a day to see us while we were in town. It was fun to have all the grand kids together and I was able to get this shot of my parents with the three of them!

This little boy always has that tongue out, especially when he is happy!

Chubbers!

There's that tongue again! He is getting so dang big!

::::Halloween::::

I put off getting a costume for Cole waaay too long and ended up having to kind of scramble to find one for him. He had mentioned he wanted to be a ghost so I went to a Halloween store, bought a ghost costume, cut the bottom and the sleeves to fit him, threw out the mask and painted his face to match. Not the best costume ever but oh well, he liked it.

And here's my little monkey!

My two boys! I couldn't get a good picture because Blake fell over once on accident and after seeing that, Cole decided it was funny and started trying to push Blake over. That kid, seriously!

Cole fell asleep on the way to the mall for Trick-or-Treating!

He's just so dang cute!

Every monkey needs a banana!

Trick-or Treat!!!

Enjoying the spoils of the day!

Whew! And that's it! See you again soon... hopefully sooner than a month ;)

Go Huskies! Plus a Beach preview!

2010-09-12T15:57:00.000-07:00

Finally home! We've been out of town for the past 1 and a half weeks and it is sooo nice to be back at home. Nick went to Utah for the BYU/UW game while I stayed in Spokane with my sister. Then we headed to Kennewick for a few days before heading off to the Oregon Coast with Nick's family. We had such a blast! It was definately so much fun to be at the coast and it was so relaxing being around kids who were equally as wild and crazy as mine... must be a Parker thing ;)

I have a TON of pictures but it's going to take me awhile to go through them all so in the mean time here's one of my favorites:

The beach was so beautiful and the weather ended up being perfect! This picture was right before sunset and I was loving the sun flair and silhouette thing going on!

Okay, that was just a little teaser. Believe me there are MANY more pictures to come!

On a side note, yesterday was the first home game for UW football! Go Huskies!

We bought season tickets this year so we were excited to check our seats out! They are waaaaaay up there but luckily every seat has a pretty good view! I forgot my camera but here are a few pics taken with Nick's phone!

Sea of purple!

The view from our seats :)

Be back soon with more coast pics and a blog remodel!!!

August 20th-30th

2010-08-30T21:03:00.000-07:00

Look! I'm doing a little better and am actually posting a new post within a few weeks! We've had an eventful few weeks. Mel, Luke and the kids stopped by for the weekend, then the boys and I headed down for a visit with my mom and sis. We also made a short day trip to Friday Harbor (San Juan Islands) this past Saturday! Here are the pics:

Cole and the girls posing with the Komodo Dragon. This is the first time we've been able to get Cole to pose with these statues at the zoo! Amazing what a little peer pressure can accomplish! LOL

Cole, Memphis and Lola playing some ball in the backyard. Cole had a blast running around with Memphis! He was so happy to have a big boy to play with!

Nick and Cole at GameWorks.

Cole and me playing one of the games.

We collected a TON of tickets (about 1000) at GameWorks and Cole got this cute little plane! He had so much fun "flying" it around on the sidewalk outside of GameWorks in downtown Seattle.

We also checked out Pike Place Market. It was pretty hectic but still fun! Plus, I got some chowder and crabcakes :) Yum!

While riding in the car, Cole had waaaay too much fun playing with his fruit snacks! "Look Mommy, I have oranges for eyes!" I just had to snap this photo while I was driving!

Cute little boy getting held on our walk because he was too cranky for the stroller.

I got myself a slurpee for the ride home and of course I had to get one for Cole too. He was a mess but he kept telling me how yummy his "cherry juice" was!

Blake has turned into such a happy baby. He loves it when we sit and talk with him, he coos and smiles the whole time.

So amused!

Cole was so excited when Nick started mowing the lawn. He grabbed his little chair from inside the house and put it on the patio so that he could watch and cheer Nick on.

This is the look he would give me every time Nick went by with the lawn mower! Pure happiness!

Silly boy! I really wanted to get some cute pics of Cole in one of his new outfits and this is what I ended up with instead!

San Juan Islands:

A self portrait in the car on the way there. Just because... Plus I really love this new cardigan!

Nick showing Cole the sights from the ferry!

Checking out the back of the wake at the back of the ferry. Cole was really excited to be on a "big boat" Plus it was the perfect weather!

It was so sunny that the only good pic of Cole we could get was inside. Otherwise he was covering his eyes.

Like this....

Cole and his "treasure map" He spent the rest of the ride calling us "Mommy Pirate" Daddy Pirate" "Cole Pirate" and "Baby Blake Pirate"

At "Friday's Crabhouse"... Cole was too hyper to stay seated so we just let him stand there, LOL!

Getting ready to jump off the stairs... Did I mention how hyper he was?

After dinner we grabbed some ice cream. Cole got his own cone of strawberry ice cream but he still wanted like a million bites of my mango sorbet, LOL!

Some hugs while waiting to get back on the ferry.

After sleeping the whole day in his stroller, Blake was one happy little boy!

That's all for now. Nick is head to UT for the BYU vs. Huskies game this weekend (I'm hanging out with my sis in Spokane) and then we head down the the Oregon Coast for a family trip with the Parker fam. We are definitely ready for a vaca and it will be nice to spend some time with Nick's family!

Huge Catch-up! July/August

2010-08-19T14:57:00.000-07:00

Ahhh! Okay so I am way behind and it took me F.O.R.E.V.E.R to get this post ready! I need to start doing this more often so I don't have sooooo many pictures to do in one post! Anyways, here they are:

Little Mr. Serious

This is what happens when I leave Cole downstairs by himself for too long!

Watching the raptor show at the zoo. He wasn't too sure about that owl.

Trying to get a better look.

With mommy at the zoo.

with daddy at the zoo.

Cole LOVES to run!

Cole and Alyssa playing with play-doh.

I bought this cool sprinkler thing for Cole thinking it would be a fun way to cool off in this heat. Of course, Cole just cried and refused to get in it because it was too cold... wimp! I can't complain too much because he kind of takes after me, hehe ;)

Poor boy fell asleep on the couch. Sooo sweet though!

Cole decided to sneak in a kiss while I was trying to get some pics of Blake.

A few weekends ago, the boys and I headed over to Spokane to see my sister and her baby! On the first day we went to Discovery Park and let Cole run around and go crazy.

Just chillin...

He thinks he's so silly!

Spinning

Charlie's first time swinging! (It was Erin's idea, I just want to make that clear.) LOL

Blake and Charlie, only 5 days apart in age. She is waaaay smilier than him but he still has a cute little smirk.

She is so stinkin' cute!

On the second day we headed to Manito park to check out the gardens.

Cole was sooo tired after running around the garden for like 30 mins. Erin and I just waited around until he wore himself out and then I ran after him to catch him. He is getting sooo fast! His poor face was bright red and he was covered in sweat!

Silly boy! Pretending to be mad.

Sweet little smile.

We were watching a couple of boys for our neighbor and Cole was having so much running around the house with them. He takes after his dad and his face turns BRIGHT red when he runs around too much!

Cole and Alyssa playing at Mcdonald's.

We went to a work BBQ for Nick's district and by the time we left Cole was covered in dirt, sweat and dog slobber. Yeah, he had a good time, LOL!

Cole playing "Patty Cake" with Blake.

We have the Bonecks coming to see us this weekend, Yay! And then I head down to Kennewick with the boys to visit my parents and sister so I should have plenty of photos to post by the end of next week! :)

Saturday Outing: Lake Chelan/North Cascade Loop

2010-07-11T17:45:00.001-07:00

This weekend we...

Went swimming:

Picked blueberries and had lunch at Blueberry Hills Farm:

Became extremely disappointed with our car GPS when we ended up on a little gravel road in the middle of no where and discovered that it wanted us to stay on that road for 40 miles! We ended up turning around, ignoring the GPS and finding our own way! *gasp*

Drove the North Cascade Loop, stopped at a few scenic overlooks and went for a short hike/walk through the woods:

The End!

The Long Overdue P365 Post!

2010-07-08T18:36:00.000-07:00

Okay so remember when I said I would update this like once a week... yeah I lied!! Oops!!

Oh well, here are about a months worth of photos!

He is too!

My boys all ready for church!

All ready for bed! Yes, Blake slept in his bouncy chair for the first month or so. Don't worry, he sleeps in his crib now.

From a mini photo shoot I did with Blake and Cole for Blake's announcements.

I would like to introduce you to Cole's "buddies" He brings all 5 of these guys all over the house with him. Only three of them are allowed out of the house, I tell him the other two are too big for the car. He hardly has any room in his toddler bed because they take up most of it!

We've been trying to go on little family outings on Saturdays. We went to the zoo a few weeks ago:

The penguins were actually out and Cole loved them!

I thought it would be cute to get a pic of Cole with these monkey statues but as you can see, he's not too sure about the whole thing. I think he thought that monkey was going to come alive and grab him! ;)

Checking out the elephants!

Look at that crazy hair! He's already starting to lose some of it :(

So Sweet!

Blake and Charlie at the baby shower.

The next Saturday we went to Snoqualmie Falls and the Snoqualmie Railroad Museum:

Eating his Spongebob Ice Cream! That thing made a MESS!

At the falls!

Playing on the tracks with daddy. They were really old tracks that weren't in use anymore.

Little Man.

Last Saturday we checked out the Everett Children's Musuem. Cole loved it so much! I think we might get a years pass.

This was the water exhibit, Cole loved it there.

We had Blake's baby blessing on Sunday.

Cole was terrified of all the fireworks in our neighborhood so this was how he spent 4th of July while we were out on the porch watching the show. Poor boy! He was fine once I turned on cartoons, although he never did take that blanket off his head.

Smiles!

It's HOT in this house so shirts are optional! ;)

Well, hopefully I will be better now that I am caught up.... yeah right!

P365 Catch Up!

2010-06-04T21:53:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I am way way way behind on posting my 365 pictures!! I am soooo glad to finally be posting these, it took me forever to get them all ready. I am really going to try to post once a week so that it's not such a huge ordeal!!

Soooo, I'm missing a TON of days. I guess I just got too lazy to take pictures the last few weeks of pregnancy! LOL

At church Cole made me a cute little necklace for Mother's day. It has a little pendant on it with the cutest little picture of him. The only problem is that he was a little confused about whose necklace it was. Sometimes he would "give" it to me but then he would want it back to wear it, haha!

Playing out in the backyard!

We headed to a little airplane festival at Paine field. All of the private plane owners had their planes out for display and you could go and sit in some of them. Cole loved it!

Okay, this isn't a P365 pictures but it is 3 days before I had Blake and DANG! look how huge I was!!! Crazy!!!

Okay, a few of these are going to be repeats but I wanted to keep them all together for P365.

Happy Birthday Blake!!

First head bonks with daddy.

Cole thinks it's so cute that Blake can grip his fingers.

Cole feeding his little brother!

Blake ended up being super jaundice and we had to have a special light bed brought to the house for a few days. He had to be in it 24 hours a day except for feedings. The less jaundice he became the more alert he was.

Love that little profile and that hair!!

Cole loves playing with his baby brother.

A rare happy looking face. He usually looks like a grumpy old man, haha!!

Cole has really been fighting nap time lately and so we end up having to lock him in his room to keep him from coming out. When I check on him later he is always asleep in the weirdest way. He's been on the floor a couple times or like this day, is just upside down in his bed.

Sweet baby boy!

Blake's first bath. He wasn't thrilled with the whole getting out part.

Blake and Charlie (my little sister's daughter born 5 days before Blake). Charlie usually looks very happy and jolly but for some reasons she looks cranky in all the pics I have of her, LOL. I think she was hungry!

Cole holding Blake at a rest stop on our way home. He was so upset when we had to put Blake back in his car seat.

I had Cole put a TON of his toys in a storage box and in exchange he got some new "big boy" Legos. He loves building all sorts of castles and airports which mean I am on the floor ALOT helping him.

"Maybe if I stay still long enough she will give up on this whole Tummy Time thing"

Helping give Blake a bath. I put Cole on the head side this time because last time he almost got peed on, lol!

Such a sad little face!

I've been reading a lot lately (it takes Blake over an hour to eat so I've got to do something.) I was sitting on the couch yesterday and I heard Cole behind me saying "Oh yes" and turned around to find him "reading" my book.... upside down. haha!

Whew! I'm happy to be caught up!! Now I need to redo my blog design but that might not be for another week or so....

Big Brother Cole

2010-05-22T22:08:00.001-07:00

Okay, so we were sooo worried about how Cole was going to handle having a new baby brother. He's use to getting a lot attention so I thought for sure that he was going to be so jealous and have such a hard time. We really tried to build up the excitement for him. We talked a lot about "His Baby" Blake. So when Nick dropped him off at the neighbors house and told him that he would get to meet baby Blake the next day, he was pretty excited!

Cole meeting Blake for the first time.

Giving Blake his first kisses.

Cole was so cute with Blake in the hospital. He was so happy to see him and was so gentle with him. Since coming home, Cole has been completely OBSESSED with his little brother. We hear a lot of "I need to see the baby." " I need to touch the baby." "Nice baby mommy." He always wants to give Blake little pats on the face, little hugs and little kisses. He will run run run all over the house and then creep up to Blake and give him a little pat on the face and take off running again. Anytime anyone is holding Blake, Cole has to be right there to see the baby.

Holding hands, Cole thought it was so funny that Blake could grasp his hand.

Helping feed the baby. Cole sat so still and fed Blake an entire bottle.

Giving Blake a little kiss.

And a little hug.

Cole leaned in for a hug and Blake thought his chin felt like something good to munch on.

Just a little story to show just how attached Cole is to his new baby brother...

The other day I saw him grab a package of Starbursts and run upstairs. Nick ran up to his bedroom to take it away and found Cole hiding in his bed. As soon as Nick took the candy away Cole started SCREAMING. He was sooo mad and came stomping downstairs. I noticed that he was making his way over to Blake, who was on the couch, and I got up because I was worried he might take his anger out on the baby. Man, was I wrong. Cole came downstairs bawling and went straight over to his brother and laid his little head down on him for a hug. It was the cutest thing I've ever seen!! I went over there and asked if he was sad and he said "Yeah, make me feel better...." I just think it is so sweet that Blake has become such a person of love and comfort to Cole already. I'll be sure to remind of him of this during the years that he whines about his annoying little brother... hehe!!!

Some photos from the hospital.

2010-05-20T22:04:00.000-07:00

Here are some photos from our hospital stay...

Me and Cole enjoying some dinner.

Daddy and his two buddies.

Grandpa and Blake

Grandma and Grandpa got stuck changing the first poopy diaper.

First head "bonk".

Mommy and Blake ready to go home

My big baby!

Blake and his little buddy from Cole.

Coming tomorrow, some photos of Blake and Cole. P.S. Cole is completely obsessed with his new baby brother!!

The Birth of Blake Edmund Parker

2010-05-20T04:03:00.001-07:00

He's here!!!! And I am finally getting a chance to blog a little, thanks to a great daddy whose willing to feed him at 3 in the morning while I blog :)

So here's how it all went down:

For over a week now I have been having Braxton Hicks every 15 min on and off throughout the day and night. They never hurt, just a tightening feeling. Well, on Monday the 17th, these contactions started happening every 5 min consistently. There was still no pain though so I wasn't too concerned.

Around 1 PM, the contractions started to hurt a little. More like gas cramps than actual contractions but they became a lot less regular. Luckily Nick had come home from work to bring me lunch and so he decided to just do some work from home... just in case...

Around 8 PM I started to worry that I was going to have to make a trip to the hospital that night. The contractions still weren't bad enough that I thought I needed to go in right then BUT they were getting slightly worse and more regular. Because Blake had been breech at one point, my dr. wanted me to go to the hospital early in the labor to make sure he was head down. Finally I decided that I would make arrangements for Cole to spend the night with a neighbor so that we could go to the hospital and if I did go into labor, my parents could just pick him up in the morning.

Around 11 PM we dropped Cole off and headed to the hospital. By this point I was having pretty bad contractions every 5 minutes and it was a VERY miserable car ride!!

We arrived at the hospital around 11:20 and the nurse started checking to see what position Blake was in. When I got there she asked me what my pain level was, I told her it was about a 7 on a scale of 1-10. She asked me what my pain tolerance was, like when I would definitely need a epidural. I told her probably a 8 or 9 out of 10. While checking me she told me that I had lied and that I definitely had a higher pain tolerance and that I would understand once she told me how dilated I was. She confirmed that Blake was head down and then informed me that I was at 7 cm, almost 8 cm!!! YIKES!!! She said that my water sack was "bulging" and that if it had broken at home, Nick would have been delivering our baby in the car on the way to the hospital.

Okay, at this point I am FREAKING out that they weren't going to get the epidural in before the birth. It took awhile because my blood pressure was high (probably due to the whole freaking out thing.) so they needed to do some blood tests before the epidural. Finally the dr came in and I got my epidural. I was sooo relieved!

Me chilling after getting the Epi.

Me and Nick excited to meet our baby boy!

It was 1 AM when I got the epidural and by 5 AM I was still at an 8. My water hadn't broken yet but the dr. wanted to try and let it break on it's own. The baby wasn't showing any signs of stress so they weren't in any hurry. We were a little sick of waiting but overall everything was pretty chill.

Then at 5:35 AM my water broke and things go intense REALLY fast. Around 5:50 I was at 10 cm and was having strong urges to push. The dr hadn't been called in yet but the nurse went ahead and had me do a "test" push. Her and Nick held my legs and after just one little push she immediately told me to stop pushing. Nick said "Whoa! Was that the head?!?" and sure enough it was. They went ahead and called my dr at that point and for the next 20 min I had to resist the urge to push. This was ~~probably~~ definitely the worst pain I have ever felt in my life. For some reason the epidural had really worn off (despite pushing the button for more meds) and I was feeling a lot of the pain from the contractions. Not to mention I felt like I was going to explode if I didn't start pushing soon! They were having me doing special breathing and I was breathing so fast that my face started to go numb. LOL! At 6:18 am I was just getting to the point that I was going to tell them that I couldn't hold it anymore and that baby was coming NOW when the doctor came walking through the door. He grabbed my leg and told me to give a big push and out came that baby. That's right, one push and he came flying out, LOL!! Good thing too because I was definitely had all feeling "down there".

Blake was sooooo perfect. He gave a little cry right away and then quieted down as soon as they laid him on me. The first thought that went through my head was "Oh my gosh! He's a redhead!!!" I was so shocked, I thought for sure that we would never have a red headed baby. I have to admit that I am totally in love with his hair and I really hope that it never changes!

Blake Edmund Parker

8 lbs. 6 oz. 20 1/4 inches long

May 18th, 2010 at 6:18 AM

My little red head!

So happy to have him out!

The proud daddy!

Our sweet baby boy!!

And that's how Blake Parker made his way into this world! I have lots of more pictures to post but since I am literally falling asleep at the keyboard right now, they are going to have to wait!!! Thank you to Becky Johnson and my parents for helping out with Cole, I don't know what I would have done with out you guys!!! :)

P.S. Please excuse all my typos and bad grammar! I am drugged up and tired so things are little fuzzy now! ;)

Blake's Nursery!

2010-05-11T16:44:00.000-07:00

So I have finally finished the nursery!! Yay!!

Our budget was pretty small plus we are renting so I didn't go all out with painting the walls or anything but I still think it turned out pretty cute. Luckily I already had all the furniture and some bins and stuff leftover from Cole so it didn't end up costing me much.

I went back and forth on a theme but finally settled on dinosaurs after seeing these ADORABLE digital scrapbook dinos by Jacque Larsen!

I made the wall hangings first and had them printed out. I got some 12x12 frames on etsy for $6 each which was amazing! I found a Pottery Barn GC from 3 years ago in some of our storage boxes so I was able to get a crib skirt from there. I printed out one of the dinos and used iron on to make the crib skirt. We don't use a crib bumper so other than a crib skirt, I just picked up some cheap sheets from Babies'R'Us. I searched EVERYWHERE for a light blue valance but ended up having to settle for a darker blue one. I ironed dinos onto that too. I found some super cute plush dinos online and ordered a few of those for some finishing touches!

Here's the end result...

The wall prints:

From the doorway:

The crib w/ the prints. We will be putting the rail back on before the baby is born ;)

Close up of crib:

Changing table:

Okay, Baby Blake... we're ready for you!!! Your big brother is waiting to play with you!! Don't worry, I'll make sure he puts some pants on first! HA!

Week 14 (?) of P365

2010-05-03T12:14:00.000-07:00

Still no baby... okay okay, I know that I am still weeks away from my due date but I am still hoping! LOL!! Here are our latest pics, I missed some days but I'm not too stressed about it!

Cole brought his little stepping stool in from the bathroom to use as a chair in his bedroom.

My parents were in town for a baseball game so they stopped by the house. Cole enjoyed showing grandma his basketball skills.

Another nice day so we went out back to blow some bubbles. Cole always wants to blow them himself but he doesn't quite get it yet!

I asked him for his "nice" smile and this is what I got. He looks so sweet!

Cole is obsessed with taking pictures. I let him use out Olympus because it is shock proof and water proof. His fingers end up in most of the shots but oh well, it's a start!

This is what happens when Cole skips his nap. He ends up falling asleep at 6 PM while watching cartoons.

Daddy brought us home Hot Dog on a Stick. Cole loves corndogs! He was too busy watching TV to look at the camera!

Cole decided to color all over our carpet! Thanks kid!

37 weeks and HUGE!! I am so much bigger this pregnancy!! I'm hoping it's mainly fluid and not a big baby!!

Cole loves running upstairs, yelling "Try to get me mommy!" and hiding in our closet! Silly kid!

That's all for now. Hopefully I will get better at this!! I am working on the nursery right now and should have pics soon. The theme is "dinosaurs" and I was inspired by this scrapbook kit...

P365 - Weeks 10-13 (ish)

2010-04-15T14:17:00.000-07:00

Okay so I am obviously WAY behind on posting my pictures and not only that but I missed like a gazillion days this time! The good news is that this baby is almost out of me and then I might be a little bit more motivated to take some pictures!!

Nick and I took Cole to Jump Planet! He had a blast on the giant slide!

Cole loves reading books.

Crazy hair!

He insisted I put these gloves on him. Plus I think it is so funny how he sticks his tongue out while he runs!

We went to Spokane to visit Erin and Kyle. Nick, Cole and I rode the sky tram over Spokane Falls. Cole loved it!

Cole playing his iPhone games on Erin's couch.

Not sure what "face" this was but I just think it's adorable!

We've had a lot of pajama days lately. I especially like it when our pajamas are color coordinated, hehe!

Cole wearing his "Umi Goggles" He loves the show "Team Umi Zoomi"

Okay, so this was a HUGE deal. Cole actually picked up a live worm and he wasn't freaked out or anything. That's a big deal for my timid little boy!

Nick's company paid for him to go to the Final Four this year. He is a huge college basketball fan so he was soooooooo excited for this trip! This is him at the Indianapolis airport on day 1.

My mom and I threw a baby shower for Erin. Everyone was insistent that we got a double belly picture so here it is!

Easter egg hunt!

Nick at the championship game.

All ready for church. Such a handsome little boy in his church pants and tie.

Nick got some last minute Mariner's tickets from work so the three of us went to the Opening game at Safeco field. It was the first time that Cole really understood what was going on and he loved acting out the throwing, hitting and catching!

At church they drew an outline of Cole on this big piece of paper and when we got home I taped it on the wall so that we could color it. Cole had a blast drawing all sorts of stuff on it! It stayed up there for days!

Cole burrowed into the pile of clean laundry on our floor and announced to me that it was "his home" and that he was "a worm". Silly kiddo!

Whew! Okay, caught up! Like I said, there were quite a few missing days in there but oh well. Hopefully I will have a new little one to show you all in the next few weeks (hey! A girl can wish right?!?)

P365 - Week 9

2010-03-16T22:23:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I've had these photos edited and ready to go since Saturday but kept forgetting to actually post them... oops!! Here they are! :)

Cole loves to be tickled! He's such a silly kid!

I took Cole to the dr. because he had a cough for almost 4 weeks and it had gotten to the point where he was coughing every few minutes. It wasn't a horrible sounding cough, more just like a tickle in his throat but it was constant! Well, it turned out that he had an ear infection!! Go figure! It was his first ear infection and so it was his first time taking Amoxicillian. After a TON of trial and error, I finally figured out that he would take the medicine if I hid it in some frozen yogurt. Oh, this is his "sad" face BTW!! LOL

Silly boy put the hamper over his head and started climbing up and down the stairs. Yeah, that's just an accident waiting to happen.

Cole went to Home Depot with Nick and had some fun on the lawn mowers. (taken with iPhone)

Cole has DEFINITELY hit his terrible two's and this is a face we are seeing more and more of!

Big boy sippy cup! We finally got to the point where he doesn't scream every time he realizes I'm getting him one of these instead of the sippy cups with the straws in them.

Hiding from Mommy's camera, he's definitely getting sick of this photo a day thing, LOL!

Cole's favorite game is to have us throw the ball for him and then he runs and gets it and throws it back. It definitely releases some energy!

I failed by 1 hour glucose test so I had to go back and take a 3 hour glucose test. Basically I had to go in at 8:30AM (without eating anything after midnight the night before.) and drink this nasty sugar drink. The worse part was sitting in the dr. office waiting room for 3 hours so that they could draw my blood every hour. The good news is that I passed the test!! :)

The lighing on this picture is HORRIBLE (the light from the outside tricked my camera flash.) but I just think it is sooo cute! We were looking at birds out the window and a big flock flew by and Cole was thrilled!

I'm off to go watch LOST now. I am sooo happy it is the last season because I have some small hope of actually figuring out what is going on!! LOL

P365 - Week 8

2010-03-03T20:18:00.000-08:00

Pretty uneventful week... The weather has been nice so we have been spending some time outside but other than that we've had some pretty lazy days! LOL

Playing outside at the neighborhood play area. (taken with my iPhone)

Cole playing with his train track. He kept closing his eyes while I was trying to take his pic so this is him laughing about that!

Cole LOVES to go in the backyard and have "races" with mom. He lines himself up in a starting position and shouts "Ready, Set, GO!" and then we take off running. Well, he runs... I kind of waddle walk behind him and pretend to run, LOL!

"Mac & Cheeeeeeese" Cole's favorite lunch to share with mommy.

Thumbs up! All bundled up to go out for a walk... it was kind of rainy this day!

Cole perches himself on the window sill behind our couch so that he can look outside at all the plants and birds. I am going to buy a bird feeder for the tree out back so that there will be more birds to see.

We met Nick for lunch at Red Robin and Cole loves drinking his pop! (taken with Nick's iPhone)

P365 - Week 7

2010-02-22T16:29:00.000-08:00

I got lazy this weekend and never posted my pics! Oops! Here they are...

Nick took a business trip to Portland so Cole and I went to Kennewick for a few days. Cole loves my parents' dog, Blair. Here he is running around Blair laughing.

Shoving his cars into Blair's face.

Going down the slide with Grandma.

Driving by myself to and from Kennewick with just Cole was definitely a new experience. He kept screaming because the sun would be in his eyes so I gave him an old pair of sunglasses and the next time I looked back there this is how he looked. It cracked me up! This is also my attempt at taking a picture of him while driving.

Corndog!

Playing baseball in the backyard with Mommy.
It's been soooo nice here the last few days and we have definitely been taking advantage of it. Everyday Cole and I play in the backyard for awhile and then walk down to the neighborhood play areas to play on the slides. It really makes me happy that we chose to move into this house!

Coloring pictures with Daddy.

Snoozing on the couch.
We have church from 1-4 on Sundays so Cole always misses his nap. He is usually either really crazy and cranky all day or he ends up falling asleep on the couch around 6 while watching cartoons. Nick was just happy to be able to get some cuddles from him, LOL!

Playing on the slides in our neighborhood. It's suppose to be getting rainy again tomorrow! I can't wait for spring and summer to get here... well maybe not summer, we don't have A/C!

P365 - Week 6

2010-02-12T14:02:00.000-08:00

It's been a pretty lazy week around here! Nick is still somewhat hindered by his knee surgery. Cole came down with a nasty cold on Sunday and it has lasted all week. I, of course, started getting the same cold on Wednesday and am feeling pretty crappy today! Needless to say, we spent most of the week in our PJ's!! Oh, and I missed a day. I was feeling too lousy to come up with a picture to take, oh well!!

Here it is... the preggo belly. Nope, that's not a basketball in my shirt! 25 weeks.

Nick had a conference call that he took downstairs so Cole and I were stuck upstairs watching cartoons in bed. Thank goodness for Nick Jr. on iTunes!!

My poor sick baby! This is probably the sickest he's ever been (we've been INCREDIBLY lucky!). Poor boy looked so miserable everyday! He thought it was hilarious that I was taking his picture right as he laid down for his nap.

I needed a certain picture for a scrapbook page (a picture with the number 5 in it). So instead of actually writing the 5 on the sign and trying to get Cole to hold it right, I just took a picture of him with a blank piece of paper and then added the 5 in later with photoshop. Anyways, kind of a fun technique and now I can have the little sign say anything I want... muhahahaha!

Cole loves brushing his teeth after bath time. I let him go at it for a little while and then I take over to make sure they actually get brushed! ;)

Well, Nick is headed out of town for business Sunday-Wednesday this week so Cole and I around going to head down to Kennewick to visit my parents! It'll be nice to get out of the house for awhile!!

P365 - Week 5

2010-02-06T18:33:00.000-08:00

Okay, so I'll admit it, I missed one day this week!! Oops!

Cole skipped his nap on Saturday and since daddy was downstairs watching basketball, we cuddled in the bed and watched "Dora" on my computer. He was too tired to smile for the camera!

Cole has this adorable new laugh that he does when he thinks something is really amusing. He opens his mouth up wide and tips his head back, it's so cute! I had a hard time getting a good shot of it, hence the off center shot!

We love going to Mcdonald's with Chelle and Alyssa. Chelle and I sit and chat while the kids play on the toys. Cole usually just runs up to the table for a couple fries and a quick drink before heading back out to play.

Nick had micro fracture surgery on his right knee. This is a self portrait from the pre op area. (I wasn't allowed in because of Cole.)

We had another ultrasound to check up on the baby's kidneys (everything is great.) and so we have a few more pictures of our baby boy.

Nick's 31st birthday! Since he just had surgery, we couldn't really go anywhere. So we just ordered pizza and I made a cake. I was telling Nick that I'm pretty sure it is only the second, maybe third, cake I've made for him since we've been married. He should feel pretty special, even Cole didn't get a cake made for his birthday, LOL!

*******
Oops! Missing Day! :(
*******

The weather was actually nice today so we took Cole out to the park. He loved the slides. There was also a dock and a lake and he loved looking at all the ducks.

Okay, I have to go get Cole a popsicile now, LOL! He's crying for one downstairs and I told Nick that I was not going to make another trip down and up the stairs until I had finished this post. This baby (well, mainly just my belly) is getting WAY too big and the stairs are killing me! Nick is on crutches for 6 weeks so I am having to do a lot more around the house lately. Hopefully I have better luck next week and I actually take all of my pics! :)

P365 - Week 4

2010-01-30T11:04:00.000-08:00

Another week of pics...

Nick took Cole to run some errands and they brought me home some flowers. Cole was so excited about them and loved smelling them. He kept saying "mmm Yummy Flowers!"

Cole was TERRIFIED of this bear when we bought him a few months ago but all of the sudden on this day he decided that he wanted to play with him and that he wasn't scary anymore. Go figure!

This is the response I got when I told Cole I wanted to take his picture! Get use to it kid!

My sister Erin was in town for a few days visiting us and on Wednesday we went to the zoo. We walked around for 3 hours and saw almost all of the animals! It was a lot of fun!!

Cole has a new obsession with stickers and he loves putting them on his forehead!

We had to get up at 5:30 AM on this day to take Erin to the airport and then we were at Nick's basketball game until past 9 PM so by the end of the day, my little boy was TIRED!!

"Hi Mommy" Silly boy!

Nick is having knee surgery on Tuesday so wish us luck!! I'm hoping that I will be able to handle him and Cole for the next few weeks, LOL!

P365 - Week 3

2010-01-22T19:20:00.000-08:00

Yay! I've made it to week 3!!

Happy Birthday to Me!! (with cake from Claim Jumpers)

Cole saw daddy changing a light bulb and wanted in on the action.

We went to Build-a-Bear with Chelle and Alyssa. Cole made this cute little puppy and on the way home he told me "I love him"! Here he is giving his puppy ("Brown") big hugs!!

Silly Boy!

Diego Pull-Up Diapers! The first small step towards potty training!

Bedtime with Daddy! (Yes, I forgot to take a picture until right before bed!)

Just like daddy... talking to his peeps while in the car!

Videos from Jump Planet

2010-01-22T19:12:00.000-08:00

Today, Cole and I went to a place called Jump Planet with Chelle and Alyssa. Cole was kind of freaked out at first but he ended up really liking this giant slide! We're thinking that the kids might have a little more fun there in 6 months or so.

Here's a couple of videos:

P365 - Week 2

2010-01-16T11:22:00.001-08:00

Here are week 2 pictures of P365!

Cole loves "swimming" in his bath tub!

All ready for church.

I came home from running errands to find Nick and Cole dancing in the living room! Cole was having soooo much fun busting a move, lol!

We went to dinner at Red Robin. I love it when they put us in a back booth by the window because Cole loves looking out the window at all the cars. (taken with Nick's iPhone.)

Playing in the Kid's Zone at Bellevue Square.

Watching Daddy play church basketball. (Nick is number 42)

He dumped all of the clothes out of the hamper and used it as his "doggie house". He loves to pretend to be all different sorts of animals.

In other news: We *might * start potty training in the next week or so! I went and bought a potty seat, a step stool and some pull ups so we're getting close! Yikes!

Also, we found out this week that Nick is going to have to have knee surgery within the next month. He has some cartilage damage in his right knee so he will be having micro fracture surgery. The doctor said that he will have to use crutches for 6 weeks and won't be back to playing basketball for at least 6 months!! We're hoping that he will be able to start driving and going back to work after 1 week!

Be back next week with more pics! :)

P365 - Week 1

2010-01-08T15:30:00.001-08:00

Here they are, the first week of Project 365 pictures!!

Watching the Rose Bowl!

Driving home from Kennewick

Cole's new favorite breakfast: Jelly Toast!

Cole LOVES to randomly scream! He makes the funniest face while he's doing it!

My two boys! As soon as I handed Cole the ultrasound picture, he started saying "It's a monkey! It's a monkey!" Nice kid, real nice...

Playing with his new car rug.

He loves to jump off the stairs. Lately he has been trying to jump from the second and third stair and I keep having to remind him to only jump from the last one. Crazy kid!

Lazy Day - laying on the floor watching cartoons in his PJ's.

So far so good. Hopefully I can keep it up for the rest of the year! :)

Holiday Catch-Up

2010-01-07T22:55:00.001-08:00

I haven't blogged in forever soooooo here's what's been going on....

We took Cole to see Santa at the mall and he FREAKED out! We tried to psych him up for it and he was really excited about it until he realized he was going to have to sit on some strange man's lap, lol! He screamed the entire time! Oh well, hopefully next year will be better!

Enjoying a sucker he got from Santa.

Daddy and Cole hanging out outside the mall.

Cole with his new train track from Mom and Dad.

Cole riding his new motorcycle from Grandma and Grandpa.

We spent a week and a half in Kennewick with family for the holidays. Nick's brother Alex and sister Brigitte were both in town with their families so it was fun to see everyone!!

Here some pics of Cole with his cousins...

Cole and Rylie showing their Happy faces.
(Cole just discovered emotions and loves to play around!)

Sad Faces

Cole and Carson hanging out!

Cracking up at something funny on the TV. Silly boys!

In other news... We just found out that we are having another boy. My due date is May 21st. I have decided to *attempt* Project 365 (basically you take one photo everyday for a year.) which means I will have ALOT of photos to post this year! Also I am going to be redesigning the blog today or tomorrow so be on the look out for that ;)

Sugar High!

2009-11-04T17:01:00.001-08:00

On Halloween, after passing out candy to all the trick-or-treaters, Cole decided that he wanted me to tie his "Patrick" bear around his neck like a cape and then proceeded to run around the house. Yes, that is sticky candy all over his face and Yes, he is most definitely on a sugar high! LOL

He's definitely a silly silly little boy!

The Big Boy Bed!

2009-11-03T10:13:00.000-08:00

Yesterday we went and bought Cole a new "big boy" bed!! I figured since we had just moved anyways, it would be easier not even to set up his crib and just transition him into a toddler bed now! He slept in his Pack'N'Play for a couple nights and was sooooo excited to sleep in his new bed last night. Nick set it up and Cole instantly got in it and wouldn't even get out to read his bedtime stories! He slept in it really well and only fell out once during the night... hehe!!

In other news, I am sooooo close to being done with my first trimester, which means I might actually update my blog more once I'm feeling better! :)

Oops! Forgot to post these photos!

2009-09-17T11:14:00.000-07:00

Okay so these photos are kind of old, they were take back in July but I just realized I never posted them and I thought they were super cute. A couple months ago I made Cole these really cute flash cards with colors and numbers on them. Well, he has never really gotten that they are flash cards and uses them for other things, like lining them up on the floor, or putting them on the kitchen floor and using them to slide around on the floor.

He thinks it is sooo funny to put one on each foot and "skate" around. He then makes me do it with him!

Cole's New Game

2009-09-14T13:06:00.000-07:00

So a couple of days ago Cole started playing this random game! I don't know where he learned it, we sure as heck didn't teach it to him. He takes his toy bat and finds a ball (any ball will work!) puts it on the floor and hits it. Once he has hit it far enough, he throws down the bat and runs around in circles in the middle of the room. He does this over and over. The first time he did it, I just thought that maybe I gave him too many popsicles and he was on a sugar high, lol! But he's been doing it a lot lately! He's watched baseball on TV and been to a couple games, so maybe that's where he picked it up? Who knows? The mind of a 2 year old is a mystery to me!!

Enjoy!

Finally! The Sports Photos!!

2009-09-12T21:24:00.000-07:00

One of our favorite parts of living over here on the West side is that we have the opportunity to go to so many different sporting events. Last Monday, Nick's boss gave him some tickets for that night's Mariner's game. We brought Cole with us because he does really good at baseball games. We actually lucked out because even though our seats weren't aisle seat and were kind of crowded, there were a few completely empty rows right above us so we moved there. Cole had fun runnning up and down the row and being able to sit in a big boy seat!

Here he is in his seat enjoying some french fries (with ketchup!)

They also have an area you can go to at the games where you can take your picture with the Mariner's Moose. Cole is OBSESSED with this moose! He says it over and over and is so excited when we get to go see him. Although he is pretty shy, he did give the moose high five this time!

Nick also bought some tickets to a couple of UW football games this year. We took Cole to the first one since he does so well at the baseball games. Yeah, we probably won't take him to another one for awhile because he got CRAZY with all the screaming football fans! He was sooooo hyper and just out of control!

Here he is waiting for the bus to get loaded on the way to the game.

Walking through the crowds at the stadium holding Daddy's hand!

Having fun with Mommy in the stands!!

A little bit of an update: Nick actually took Cole to another UW game today, this time during the day and he did a lot better!! Nick said he loved it when the Husky Dog started barking and he would go "RUFF RUFF RUFF" with everyone!

Sunday Clothes

2009-09-10T21:36:00.000-07:00

So basically I am sucking at blogging lately!! I'm sorry but I'm here now and I have one picture for you! Yes just one, I'm too tired for the rest LOL!

But look how grown up my little baby boy looks in his shirt and tie!! SO stinkin' adorable!!

Okay, that should last you for awhile, I'll try to be back tomorrow with a few more!

Uh Oh!!

2009-09-07T13:30:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I am just sitting here on my computer, and I hear a weird noise in the background, kind of like someone rubbing something all over the wall. Being dumb, I don't really bother to see what the noise it, I just figure Cole is playing around. So I finally turn around to see what he is doing and wouldn't you know it, he's coloring ALL over the wall!!!!!!! Yikes!!

Here's his work station, as you can see he had plenty of colors to choose from and he took advantage of them all! Why in the heck did I ever change the rule of only two crayons at a time?

And here he is with his masterpiece!! LOL, yes I made him take a picture with it, is that sending the wrong message? I told him no coloring on the wall and took the crayons out of his hands before pulling out the camera, does that count?

I thought I had some magic erasers around here but I don't so I will have to wait until Nick gets home before cleaning it up! I reallllly wanted to clean it before he came home so that he would maybe never know about it! LOL Although posting pictures on this blog probably isn't the best way to keep it a secret! ;)

Okay, tomorrow I will post the sports pictures!

I'm Baaaaack! (aka Sunriver Photos!)

2009-09-06T22:59:00.000-07:00

I have been super neglectful of this little blog! I'm just going to blame it on laziness, lol! Which isn't all that surprising! Anyways, I am back and for good this time, I hope!

I'm being even more lazy today and since I have 20 photos (!!) to post, I didn't bother doing anything special with them all! And just as a warning, this post is going to be a little wordier than most because it was easier to just tell you about the photos instead of adding captions. So if you are not a fan of words, I'm sorry! LOL!

Back in August we went on a trip with my family to Sunriver, OR. The main reason for the trip (other than family bonding) was to celebrate my parent's 30th wedding anniversary!

This is them at Crater Lake. The cute thing is that we had planned on going to crater lake, and my mom started telling us a story about how when they were coming home from their honeymoon, she made my dad take a detour so that she could go see Crater Lake. They didn't even get there until it was dark but she still made him get out so that she could take some pictures. Yeah, those pictures are all black! They had never been back to Crater Lake so it was kind of special that we ended up going there on their 30th anniversary!

Nick and I (obviously!)

My brothers, Derrick and Joe, and my Dad!

The Girls: Erin, Mom and Me!

The Four Siblings! (yeah the wind was making my hair alll crazy!)

Erin and Kyle looking so cute!

and of course, my little bro, Joe "The Stud" Morgan!

I seriously LOVE these two peoples!

Speaking of cute... Here's Cole "hiding" from tickles! The only way to get him to smile for the camera is to pretend you are going to tickle him, although sometimes it backfires and you end up with a covered face!

Still cute!

Here are the guys golfing! They ended up going golfing 4 times on this trip! It was ridiculous!!

The biking beauties - Mom & Erin!

*GASP* Could that be Jamie on a bike? No it couldn't be? Could it?
Yes that's right folks, I rode a bike! Okay so it has been since around 8 ish years since I have actually bothered to ride a bike and I was a little shaky at first. I will say that at one point I forgot to use my brakes, so I just put my feet down on the ground to stop myself, which wasn't really working and I almost ran into a Port-A-Potty. Yeah, everyone that is was *so* hilarious! But I didn't fall down ever and it was actually a lot of fun, I ended up going multiple times throughout the trip! and......

That's right! I went Kayaking too! I actually HATED it though soooo yeah not sure if I will ever do that again! (Cole didn't actually go with me, that would be really hard, we just put him in there for the pic and he did not like it!)

Nick and my mom ended up kayaking back to the car, which was on the other side of the lake. The rest of us rode in the nice comfy boat! (I know you are all wondering what the heck that thing is on Nick's face! Well, my sister told him to not shave the entire trip and so he went along with it! Yeah I wasn't really feeling the whole thing and convinced him to shave halfway through the trip!)

Cole got soooooo sleepy while on the boat!

And he's out!

Nick and my parents went horseback riding during our trip. This photo cracks me up because it looks so "staged".

Riding on the trail! Mom's horse was named Rebel, Dad's was Rushmore, and Nick's was ZACH! We thought that was kind of funny and random!

On the way home, we stopped by the Lava River Caves. We hiked down the caves for awhile with our little laterns, it was freezing down there! Cole kept saying "cave" "dark" and "cold"!

Here we are just before packing up and leaving! Derrick and Joe had to leave a few days early, which is why they aren't in the photo!

Okay, so that's it for the Sunriver photos! Tomorrow I will post some photos from a couple sporting events we went to this week.... I promise!

Play Time

2009-08-18T16:51:00.000-07:00

Cole is so full of energy and loves to play. He loves piggy back rides and hiding in blankets! There's also a video of him play "Ready Set Go", he could do that for hours!

So for some reason the video isn't working on here so click this link to go see it:

http://s514.photobucket.com/albums/t345/jam1el33/?action=view&current=P1040074.flv

Running and Hiding!

2009-08-17T13:56:00.001-07:00

I'm lazy I know, but I'm back!!

Cole has gotten to the stage where whenever I need to change his diaper or get him dressed, he runs away and hides. His favorite spot to hide is under the table because he knows it is the hardest place for me to get him!!

Photo Actions!

2009-08-05T18:43:00.000-07:00

So a couple of days ago I won a random drawing for some AWESOME photoshop actions. Now if you don't know what an action is, basically it is a feature for Photoshop that makes your pictures look cool with just one click. Every action does a different thing. I ended up being the grand prize winner and so I won $100 worth of actions!!! Unfortunately I only have Photoshop Elements so I am only able to use less than half of the actions (this is just another reason I am going to HAVE to upgrade to Photoshop pretty soon!!)

I wanted to get on here and show off the actions a little because they are so much fun to use! Here is a cute little picture I have of Cole eating watermelon a few weeks ago!

disclamier: This is the very first time that I have ever added a photo to this blog that I didn't edit in some way first. Hence proving that I am not very good at taking photos, I just edit all of my photos in photoshop!! ;)

Now here is the photo after some cropping and running one of the actions called "Citrus" in the "Vintage Summer" set.

Isn't that just beautiful?!? I love the vintage feel to it!!

You can check out all of Sarah's beautiful actions here: http://myfourhensphotography.com/

Trip to the Zoo

2009-08-04T11:57:00.000-07:00

So we've been having a few "lazy days" hence why there hasn't been any new pictures! We did take a trip to the zoo a few weeks ago and I haven't posted any of the photos so here they are!

My Cute Little Monster

2009-08-02T15:01:00.001-07:00

I'm too lazy (plus it's hot) to mess around with photos today so instead I am going to post a scrapbook page a made yesterday that I am totally in love with!! It's all about my cute little "monster" and his daily adventures!

Ready for a Nap!

2009-07-31T20:56:00.000-07:00

I could tell when Cole was ready for his nap today. He just flopped down on the floor and nuzzled in between the pillows and the couch.

Hotness and a Baseball Game!

2009-07-30T10:34:00.000-07:00

I've been slacking big time lately! We all had the flu this week (one after another.) and it's been soooo hot here!! Yesterday it was 104 degrees!! I am trying to get these done before it gets too hot in my house but it's already 84 degrees in here!!

On Monday we went to a Mariner's game with Cole. He actually did really well and loved pointing at the field and saying "Ball" and "Bat".

Watermelon and Summer

2009-07-25T17:50:00.000-07:00

It is sooooo hot here! I am so wishing for some A/C! We've had the hardest time getting Cole to eat anything lately but today I was able to get him to eat some nice cold watermelon! He loved it, especially because he got to use a fork!!

The Park

2009-07-25T00:21:00.000-07:00

*Yawn* So I kind of forgot to do this earlier today and now I am super tired!! We went to the park today with Chelle and Alyssa. The kids were soooo excited to see each other, it was really cute! I took 100 pics! Here are just a few, I was too tired to do anymore than this!

Color Time

2009-07-23T10:38:00.000-07:00

The other day I bought Cole a little folding table and chair from Walgreen's (random I know, but they were the only ones who had them in solid colors.) Anyways he loves to sit in the chair and now he has a place that he can color (with my watching him, of course, so he doesn't start coloring on the wall!)

Cole and Daddy!

2009-07-22T20:15:00.000-07:00

Here's a couple photos I took this week of Nick and Cole!

Cooling Down!

2009-07-21T20:34:00.000-07:00

It's been super hot lately, not as hot as in other places that we've lived but we don't have A/C here which makes all the difference in the world! Needless to say, we're dying here! LOL! I bought some otter pops and they are the perfect fix for a cranky, hot little boy!

Pool Time!

2009-07-20T19:25:00.000-07:00

We went swimming today with Chelle & Alyssa and I am happy to say that both of the little ones liked it ALOT better today than last time! Chelle and I even got in the water, shocking I know! LOL!

Day 6 of YW - Old Memories

2009-07-19T17:20:00.000-07:00

So, one of the main reasons that we went to Island Park this year was because Nick's grandpa use to have a cabin there and the whole family would meet there every summer. While in town we made sure to visit a couple of the "old places". We check out Big Springs (with it's HUGE fish), Shotgun Village (which use to be a convenience store but is now more of a bar) and the old cabin. We also went to a little Melodrama at Mack's Inn.

And these are just a couple cute photos we took at a gas station on our looooooong drive home:

Okay, that's the end of our Yellowstone pictures! Back to the normal routine tomorrow!

Day 4/5 of YW - At the Cabin!

2009-07-17T13:29:00.000-07:00

Soooo, I missed a day yesterday!! It was just WAY too hot in my house to be on the computer due to no A/C and all of that. Anyways, I am making up for it today by posting 16 pictures!!!

In Yellowstone, the whole family stayed in one big cabin. There were 22 people total, including 11 children ranging in age of 5 months - 16 years. Here are some photos of us just hanging out at the cabin.

Still at least one more days worth!

Day 3 of YW - The Family Pictures!

2009-07-15T19:47:00.000-07:00

Since this was going to be the last time that Nick's whole family was going to be together for awhile, we decided to have a family photo shoot. We had a local lady come down and take some pictures of us all.

Later in the week, we also went to an Old Western Photo Shoot place and had another photo shoot done. Cole screamed and screamed when we tried to put his cowboy outfit on, so he only had half of it on. We were planning on getting a picture of just the three of us but it wasn't even worth it since Cole was just crying the whole time!

Still sooooo many pictures to come! :)

Day 2 of Y.W. - The Attractions!

2009-07-14T19:08:00.000-07:00

We planned our vacation so that we would have two full days in Yellowstone, just me, Nick and Cole, before the rest of the family got into town. We wanted to make sure that we would be able to get out and see everything and I am sooooo glad that we did it this way. We were able to drive around the entire park in those two days and get out of the car at most of the stops and check out all the amazing stuff! Cole did really well, he walked some of the time but most of the time he sat on Nick's shoulders. He reallllly wasn't cooperating when it came to pictures which is why there are no smiles from him here! LOL!

Still more pictures to come!

Day 1 of Yellowstone Week - The Animals!

2009-07-13T22:43:00.000-07:00

Whew! So I didn't even know where to start when it came to allll of these Yellowstone photos! I finally decided to post them by theme. I'm starting with my favorite part about Yellowstone, the animals! I was under the impression that there were going to be animals EVERYWHERE! Well, there wasn't really that many animals but we did see a bear! Plus, some elk, buffalo, eagles and deer. I was on constant "animal watch" while Nick drove! We didn't get to see a huge buffalo herd until the very end, before that it was always in 1's or 2's.

I'll be back tomorrow with more Yellowstone pictures!!

We're Back!!

2009-07-11T13:16:00.001-07:00

And I took 882 pictures!! So be prepared for a whole weeks worth of Yellowstone photos!!

Big boy glasses & Big boy hair!

2009-07-02T00:33:00.000-07:00

We are just getting packed to go on our trip to Yellowstone for the next week so I won't be posting for a little while!

We bought Cole some cute little glasses because he has started pointing to his eyes when the sun is in them and I started putting some gel in his hair. He is really starting to look like a little boy. When he has his glasses on he says "CooL" because I told him how cool he looks in them! :)

so cool.

Also, Nick goes and plays basketball on Tuesdays and one of the guys there got this sweet shot of Nick shooting a 3 pointer!

game winning shot.

Oh the Tantrums!

2009-06-30T12:40:00.000-07:00

Cole threw a HUGE tantrum today because he couldn't have a fruit snack (I ran out last night.) He was on the floor kicking and screaming! Yeah, he is kind of at that age!

An Apple a Day...

2009-06-29T16:32:00.000-07:00

I was on my computer and I heard Cole saying "Apple" in the kitchen. I looked over and he had grabbed an apple off the counter and was eating it. This is the first time that he has eaten an apple without having it cut up first. He loved it. He ended up eating all of the skin off before deciding he was done with it and setting it on the dining room chair for later! LOL!