Formal portraits

I had professional portraits taken of Evie at 3 months, 6 months, 9 months and 1 year.
It was expensive. And, frankly, I typically preferred some of the ones I took with the moments I captured.

With Max I skipped the quarterly portraits and opted for just his 1 year pics. I also decided I would recreate the one photo of Evie diving into her very first birthday cake (although, technically,  Max did enjoy his first birthday cupcake at his 1st birthday party).

I promised I would only purchase 1 portrait... but left with over $100 worth of portraits. *surprise!*
Here's some highlighted results:

Louie

The day I met him in person

Our newest family member - a fur baby.
Rescued from BARK, Louie is about 6 months old (they tell us his birthday is November 12, 2011 (11/12/11 - the same date as Rob's 40th Surprise Birthday Party (!) but who knows, really...)

Louie had 2 brothers, Jerry and Ben, whom were also adopted out around the same time. We actually took Louie home the same day Jerry went home (renamed: Carmello... poor thing). His brothers were both fuzzier and black with carmel markings similar to a Doberman. They tell us Louie is a shepherd/retriever mix... his brothers looked more shepherd and Louie looks more retriever.

Adoption day

Louie is around 22lbs now but expected to peak at 40lbs (again, we'll see!).
Evie is warming up to him and gaining confidence in bossing him around. Max simply adored him and can be found climbing him, exchanging chew toys with him or holding on to his excess skin on his rump... and using him as a self-propelled walker (Max giggles uproariously at this and Louie doesn't seem to mind at all).

Teaching Evie to be confident - Louie's first day home

We took Louie with us to my parent's house in North Caroliona (4hr trip) for Memorial Day Weekend... just one weekend after acquiring Louie. The trip went well. Louie did have 2 "accidents" in the house and suffered a bit of some bowel upset... but after a vet check-up when we got back and a few meals of rice/beef... good as new.

Dog's Life

Evie's First "Hate" Mail

Today Evie got uncontrollably angry and upset after her dad and I laughed at her. Let me back up, she was being silly and we teased her... and she didn't understand we were teasing her. We thought she was fighting back a laugh while faking a frown. We egged her on to produce tears... She spun around and had welled up eyes. Her dad and I both coo'd telling her we were only kidding her and she stormed off to her bedroom. 

Welcoming the silence, Rob and I continued to sit in the front room after she wouldn't return (we called a few times but gave up figuring she'd get into an activity and forget).

A few minutes later she returned and dropped this not on my lap before retreating to her bedroom once again.

It didn't produce the effect she was after - Rob and I both giggled.

I asked Evie to explain. She told me she crossed our her heart and frowned cause I mad her sad.

We hugged and moved on... but not without me squirreling this little gem away for future arsenal.

Max's First Birthday (Party)

Saturday, May 12. From 3-6PM.

Invitation was as follows:

Pizza, beer, cokes and juice boxes.

Smashcake for Max and cupcakes for all!

Bring your kids, bring your spirit, bring no gifts.

Informal backyard get-together to celebrate Max's survival of year one.... so many more to go.

***kid activity warning!

I have some flower pot/dirt/painting activity for the kids so be prepared for a potential mess (I have gardening gloves, hand shovels and washable paints to help minimize the impact)*** 

The day was to include a pinata, a craft, pizza, cupcakes and be rather basic. Once again, I planned for none of the chaos that comes with hosting any kid birthday party. 

I had arranged for a kiddie activity that included washable paints, foam stickers, terra-cotta flowers pots, a ginormous bag of potting soil, a selection of three kinds of small flowers: yellow marigolds, pink impatiens and purple petunias, and a large electrical wire spool as a table (thanks for the idea, KG & EG, bonus that it was FREE at Dominion Power).

The craft went well. Kids under 3 were incredibly messy but very determined to try the paints, the stickers and to do a good job. The one container of wipes I bought proved futile after a few minutes in but, thankfully, all the moms were OK with it knowing the paints were washable.

Kids over the age of 3 were extremely messy! They mixed paints, poured the paints directly into the pots and tried to fill with water, ripped stickers in half, and basically mauled all the craft supplies.

In general, the activity went well. Even better that I pulled the large trash bin alongside the table and tossed everything when they were done. Better still, when it rained a few days later it essentially "cleaned" off the table with all the washable paints.

Max and daddy

Max did pretty well out back. He still doesn't walk (in fact, he HATES to have his hands held and will hold his legs out straight in front of himself in defiance). He'll stand on both feet and find things to hang on to... but mostly he crawls or just observes. He couldn't be left unattended for very long or he'd be eating leaves, rocks and other exciting tidbits he'd discover lying about.

Here's me "lugging" Max away from another discovery of what to eat off the ground. You can tell by his and my casualness that this is a rather common occurrence.

The girls got started in the sandbox before all the party goers arrived.

The pinata was a huge hit. It contained 4lbs of candy and all of it was accounted for moments after the "#1" finally succumbed to its multiple beatings by all.

I made Max some fun monkey cupcakes I had seen at a baby shower and online. Easy to make, fun to decorate and the kids seemed to have fun choosing which silly face they could eat.

As you can see, Max thoroughly enjoyed the chocolate frosting on his cupcake. I had originally intended to get him his own smash cake but completely forgot to order one until it was too late. Frankly, no one noticed, least of all Max, and he seemed content with getting a small cupcake just like all the party goers. This was his very first cupcake/cake treat ever.

Sadly, we ran out of time before we could open any of the presents some people brought... scratch that... EVERYONE brought a gift (very nice of everyone to do even though they were asked not to - we have great friends). We continued to sit out back and open them up.... all great things we will enjoy (diapers, bubbles, stacking/knock-over blocks, knitted toys, bath toys, a shirt, board book, and more!). Here's Max playing peek-a-boo with the handmade quilt Kelly designed & created. 

All in all, Max had a very fun time and seemed to thoroughly enjoy the entire event. He never fussed or squired once (also a general mood of Max - he is rather laid back). And honestly, the clean-up afterward was rather quick and easy, too! Phew! Now let's go get ready for bed...

Max - 12 Months Old (ONE YEAR!)

Wow. One year. I really wanted to enjoy this first year in a way I didn't celebrate your sister's first year. I wanted to relish the moments, the antics you performed, the smiles you'd make when trying something that delighted you, and let you explore things at your own comfortable pace. Not mentally marking milestones, reading books, persuading you to try things out of your comfort zone and letting you explore things without me watching your every move... has made me a better mother. One can learn a lot after having had one kid before.

Max's 1 year check-up on May 23rd. Weight= 21lbs 8oz. (50th percentile) Head Circunference = 18.5" (75th percentile) Height = 2' 6.5" (50th percentile)

Notes (Evie's note to her little brother)

After a rough Saturday with Evie (Rob is in Toronto and I think she is feeling the pangs of divided attention. She normally has at least one parent's full attention but, not this weekend...)

It reads:
Max you are a good boy mine because I love you because I love my boy.

Evie tends to write the first letter of the word she wants to write, example: GB = Good Boy.

Let's hope she always feels this way.
Max is a very lucky little boy, let's hope he learns this someday.

Notes (Evie's attempt at writing)

While I had both kids by myself this weekend, we had some tense moments. During on of these moments Evie decided to play by herself (which, was a smart idea). She grabbed a baby board book about farm animals and copied the words that she saw. She excitedly showed me what she had written and asked what it said. She did pretty well and was quite proud.

The next day, after a very tense moment of me juggling feeding Max along with bringing in groceries... Evie asked from the other room:
"How do you spell 'stinky'?"
"Is it a note for me?"
"Yeah."
"What does it say?"
"You are stinky."
I rolled my eyes and spelled it. I told her that it wasn't nice either.
Evie picked-up on the fact that it was probably not wise to write me hate mail so, she edited the note. She then handed it to me for me to read:
You have stinky diapers, Max
She giggled, grabbed the paper and added to it.
"How do you spell 'poop'?" I told her the answer. "How do you spell 'and'?" I told her the answer.
The note came back:
With poop in it and pee
Evie thought this was a riot. Frankly, the fact that I could read it was a riot... particularly the words " in it" being spelled "nint".

Evie has a third sentence on her but I can't recall what it was, I'll ask and post an update.
**Update: I asked Evie and she informs me that, because I told her to "write something nice" she then wrote Why are you nice? Now, how WOGY-WD-BNOS means that is a mystery to me. I think it's actually supposed to be more Why would you be nice? but I am still unclear on the G in WOGY.

I've also included a post-it note where she came up with the word "dinosaur" and a post-it note she used to copy words out of the aforementioned baby board book about farm animals. (Should be mentioned, she knows how to spell mom, dad, Evie, Max, you and I).

(on right) Here's Evie's note where she copied words out of the farm animal board book. This copying exercise is what really kicked off writing her own note shown above...

She also attempted to write all her numbers (from memory), I've never seen her write numbers before. She recognizes them and can count up to 100 (up to 20 in spanish!) but she's never written them before.

Five minutes of Evie... video & sound

Photos don't truly capture what it's like to spend time with Evie.
This 5 minute video will give you just a snippet of any typical 13hr day with her.
This is her and I playing with "Moon Dough" at the kitchen table shortly before bedtime tonight.

Tags for this video: chatterbox, babble, blather, nonsense, and manic.