Yakety Yak

Well the other day Nolan came home with one of his "projects" from school.  It was an odd looking little thing and I couldn't quite put my finger on what kind of animal it actually was.  When I asked Nolan the first time to identify said creature he told me it was a horse.  I don't think it's a horse…

The next day Nolan was playing with his magnet letters (that's right only educational stuff going on at this house…are you reading this Ms. Jones?) and he came across the Y.  All of the sudden Nolan bursts out…"I made a Yak in school, that's what that thing is".  

AHHHHH, mystery solved!  

Now had I been an attentive parent I would have read the syllabus from last week and realized they were going over the Letter Y and perhaps just perhaps I would have put two and two together…but I kind of doubt it!

I guess when you put the two Yaks together I can see a little resemblance.  Thank God for the magnet game, I think I still would have been staring at this little guy in wonder!

Giggles Galore

My Mom had the boys yesterday and this is the text I got while sitting at work. It took all the strength I had to not run home and pinch his little cheeks!!  I could listen to him giggle all day long.

Just Hanging Out

Today we headed to the park.  It was a GORGEOUS day and I couldn't dare stay inside with the kiddos so we packed it up and headed down to the park.  What does that mean to you?  That means you get to see 1 million pictures of my kids at the park (and a special guest as well).  I mean who doesn't take 121 pictures at an average park outing?  Oh that's just me? I'm just so excited to be shooting outside again I can't stop myself!

We will start with Bennett's first time in the swing.  I think he liked it! 

Then we'll move on to the sleeper hold hugging brothers.

 Then just a little hanging out.

 Then we ate a cookie from our picnic lunch, hit up the local lemonade stand... 

(yes I'm that freak that took a picture of the random kids, but how cute is that?)

And headed home!

(yes that is the bike with no pedals and I'm standing by it)

Sleepover

Nolan had his first official sleepover the other night.  His cousins have spent the night before but he was too little to remember or enjoy it really so we figured it was high time.  We had Nolan's cousin Reid over for the night and the kids had a blast.  There was a lot of poop and booger talk, but I mean lets face it the word poop is kind of funny no matter how old you are.  Am I right?

We started the night at Fazoli's (fancy right?) because Reid told us Spaghetti was his FAVORITE.  Guest is King in this house so we were happy to oblige.  Then when we got home we decided to do something "constructive" and just to prove it I took some pictures…(notice I left out the pictures of the sugar rush we fed them just prior to this activity).

Then we moved on to running around the house like fools.  I remember at one point in my life I thought I would never let my children play with guns.  Silly Silly Me!  This would never work for multiple reasons:

1.  I married that guy in the top left box who just happens to be the biggest instigator of them all.

2.  They make some pretty awesome toy guns these days.

3.  Boys will be boys no matter what I say, and I have two of them now.  YIKES!

Then we winded down the evening with a little movie.  Aren't they precious all cozied up on their chairs.  We told Nolan he should flip the other way and get his stinky feet out of Reid's face…he wasn't having it.

The next day the boys spent the morning running in and out in and out.  Poor Little Bennett just watched in envy wishing his evil mother would just open that door and let him go.  Sorry buddy, soon you too will be pretending to be Optimus Prime but for now you're mine!

Happy Birthday Logan

It feels like I just took Maternity Pics for this clan and now I'm taking pictures of the actual baby!  Mr. Logan decided he had spent enough time inside and wanted to break out and see what this whole world was all about a little early.  My kind of boy taking charge at an early age, I like it!  Well he is healthy, Mom is doing great, big brother thinks he's pretty cool (at least he likes the present he gave him anyway) and they are all home and doing great.  Here are a few pics of the newest bundle of joy around here….quite the looker if you ask me!

Grandpa's Birthday Bash

A few weeks ago there was a little get together for Chad's Grandpa for his birthday.  He's such a sweet sweet man so it is no shock that his birthday party was well attended!  When I get to be his age I hope this many people show up for my shindig (Chad I think that means we need to have approximately 4 more kids!). 

Here is a picture of the whole crew (minus me…someone has to take the picture right!)

  

There is something about this picture that I love.  I think it's the expression on Grandpa's face, he looks so happy with Bennett on his lap.  

I love this one too.  The man of the hour with all of his girls (and his beer)!

A few party pics…

I know the party looks pretty tame and the kids all seem so well behaved.  Let me show you what was really going on outside…

Not on the Same Page

The other day I took the boys to Costco, I know risky business, but Nolan was enjoying all the free snacks that the nice ladies were handing out so the trip wasn't going horribly.  I thought we were having a grand old time actually, and then mid-chocolate caramel goodness Nolan looks at me with a huge smirk on his face and says…

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?"  I leaned in with a smirk of my own and said (all excitedly), I don't know what are you thinking?  and he replied "I'm thinking we should go home!".

Apparently our fun little trip was not so fun, but the caramel was certainly delicious.

We got you a Spiderman Cup!

Today is Chad's birthday.  These days we don't really do anything too exciting for our birthdays.  Funny how as you get older birthdays start to get less and less exciting.  At what point do you stop getting excited about birthdays that is what I would like to know.  Well Chad may have not been super pumped about his birthday but there was a certain little boy in this house that was!  As soon as Chad walked in the door tonight Nolan yelled "Dad we got you a Spiderman Cup!"  And that my friends is why I didn't tell him what we bought him until tonight!  I realize a Spiderman cup is a little strange for a 31 year old, however let me explain.  You see Chad likes his weekend coffee quite a bit but the problem is he drinks said coffee in a really pretty flowery/berry mug.  Not the "macho" mug he should, so we changed that tonight! (Don't worry we bought him a real present too, Nolan just didn't care enough about that one to "ruin" the surprise)

  

The only real "tradition" we have for Chad's birthday is that I always get him a Dairy Queen cake.  Well this morning he politely ordered me not to get him a cake (obviously he thinks I'm a last minute shopper and hadn't already bought a cake…he was right).  So there goes that 12 year tradition!  Luckily Nolan and my Mom made him a cake today complete with chocolate icing and 1 million sprinkles.  So, we sang Happy Birthday (per Nolan's request), blew out a candle (per Nolan's request) and ate some cake (per Nolan's request).  And then I took a picture (per my request) and our celebration was complete!  Happy Birthday Chad!

Dear Jack

Dear Jack,

My Mom tells me I'm giving you a real run for your money when it comes to my luscious locks.  I think that's A-OK because honestly I think you're a pretty cool cat so I don't mind following in your footsteps.  Personally I think the ladies will love it, am I right?  You are a few years older than me though so if you want to pass down any secrets for taming the fro I'd appreciate it!

Your Friend,
Bennett

We went to the park tonight and it was pretty windy which was a little entertaining with Bennett's fuzzy hair and it TOTALLY reminded me of some pictures of our buddy Jack when he got caught in the wind one day….

Pretty awesome right?  Well here is Bennett, his hair isn't quite as long yet but when it catches the wind and sun JUST RIGHT…it can get pretty interesting!

But man isn't he cute….

I believe he is saying here…"What are YOU looking at?"

Enjoy it now, after Chad sees these pictures I'm sure the next stop will be the barber shop for this kiddo. 

Dad's can be so lame.

Sea of Green…and a splash of Pink!

This past weekend we participated in a St. Patrick's Day 7k.  Yep, not a typo folks that was a "we" in that sentence.  Chad somehow convinced me that this was going to be some good old family fun and believe it or not he was right.  Chad actually ran the race, and I walked it with my friend Jessie and our two little sidekicks.  Now I will say Jessie and I did run SOME of the race.  You know the parts where people were taking our pictures, or when there was a nice long hill, or at a point we thought MAYBE our husbands would catch a glimpse of our stellar running skills!  Here is a little evidence of the race, please note that everyone is sporting their St. Patrick's Day green where I opted for the bright pink Wonder Woman shirt.  What can I say I'm a leader…not a follower.  I thought it might bring me some Super Powers at the race and let's be honest Nolan loves the dumb shirt so I thought he would think it would be cool to see me cross the finish line in all my Superhero glory.

The top left picture is the "before" picture and the bottom right is the after.  I mean nothing screams accomplishment like crossing the finish line and drinking a beer!  Oh, and the oh so cute little guys were complete angels.  They checked out the crowd for the first 15 minutes or so and then slept the rest of the way!  

After the race there was a parade.  Nolan was not so interested in the parade, but he was excited to see his cousins and play with his "rub-bands"(those dumb rubber bracelets that are shaped like things).  I adore the top left picture.  That is Collin, Nolan's older cousin, he was making sure Nolan didn't dart into any parade traffic and also making sure he got some treats in his bag.  Collin is amazing with Nolan, he always watches out for him and includes him even though he is so much younger.  Makes my heart melt and Nolan's heart happy, we are so lucky.

On the Move

Well Bennett is officially Movin' and Groovin'.  He has been attempting the army crawl for a little while now, but in the past week has really started to perfect it.  Now he's even getting up on his knees and rocking back and forth, only a matter of time until he does the official crawl I do believe.  Lord help us.

Anyway, I finally got him to perform the army crawl for the video camera so here is my little army crawler….

Sears Family

I often wonder how I get so lucky.  While doing photography I meet a lot of people, people who I probably wouldn't have met otherwise.  And I am always amazed at how nice, fun and friendly they are.  I'm starting to wonder if mean/boring people just don't get their pictures taken or something!  Well this family was no exception.  The Sears family came all the way in from Kansas City for me to take their pictures (ok ok maybe they were visiting their family, but I'll spin it whatever way I want to).  They scheduled out a little time with me on Sunday afternoon before they headed back so we could snap a few pictures of sweet little Calvin and I'm so glad that they did.  We got a kind of yucky day, so we decided to do pictures at Lisa's sister's house (my friend Lynn…see the connection?) and we were able to get some great shots.  Enjoy Lisa and Kevin…it was great meeting you!

And Logan makes 4

This past weekend I got to take some maternity pictures for one of my dear friends, and with an unexpected beautiful day we actually got to take them outside (bonus)!  I think you'll see that they have an adorable little family but they are surely ready to welcome their newest addition, Logan, in just a few short weeks.  Big Brother Jack seems to think this having a brother thing might be an okay activity…he walks around saying "I love you Logan James" and it is as sweet as can be.  Just wait until the baby actually gets here...he might change his tune! 

Ahh, and that final shot of the family of three before they become a family of 4!  

Looking good guys!  Can't wait to meet the newest member of this football 

team we are building around here!  

6 Month Pics

Every so often I HAVE to take pictures that will one day inevitably embarrass my children.  For some reason Bennett seems to be getting the brunt of it lately, sorry buddy you can't say no!  He's just so darn cute I can't help myself!  A while back I had seen some pictures of a baby in a tie.  I made a mental note (and a pin on Pinterest) to take similar pictures when Bennett could sit up.  Well he turned 6 months old, he was sitting up, so out came the camera….

I had to do his milestone picture too while I was at it, but I couldn't pick which one I liked.  

So I kept two...

And what good is a photo session without a few outtakes!  Nolan saw the picture on the bottom left and in a very concerned/serious way asked "Is Bennett a Pirate?"  Like I had been holding out all this time and didn't tell him that his brother was a Pirate or something!

Dude, I wore an Apron!

No seriously I really did wear an apron and needed it!  Can you believe it?  Nope, me either.  The other night I went to the most spectacular place with some friends of mine from work.  The best part is we got to have a Girls Night Out, but we disguised it as doing something helpful for our families!  We really are brilliant, freaking brilliant I tell ya.  Anyway, we went to a place called "Time for Dinner."  Basically you show up at this place and they have everything set up for you to cook dinners that you then put in your freezer to eat later.  When I say set up for you I mean every ingredient sitting on the table with the correct measuring device ready to go, with labels and containers below to store it.  And you know what the BEST part is?  NO DISHES!  That's right the staff there cleans it all up for you. You go from station to station and make your food and they follow behind you and clean up your mess.  I'm seriously thinking about kidnapping one of them to bring home with me, think Nolan would like a new roommate?

First station and my bag had a hole!  Not a good start.  Then Kellie pointed out that quite possibly I had also not used the proper bag.  No worries, if at first you don't succeed try try again…and also drink more wine.  That usually helps.

One recipe required white wine…..

Here is what I personally left the place with…12 awesome meals! 

Update:  We ate our first meal last night and it was SPECTACULAR. This chick will definitely be going back.  Who is coming with me?