We're back!

Hi friends. It's been a while. We had some technical difficulties for a while there. I'm not sure what we'd do without our ever talented and generous friends the Mitchels!

Looking back through the pictures from the month it's amazing to see how busy we've been. It all goes by so quickly!

I'd forgotten how long William's hair had been! This picture was taken shortly after he took a tumble down the entire flight of stairs. Tough little monster. He actually barely cried. I think it might have freaked out me and Nathaniel more than him!

Sporting some new converse!

William's best friend, William, came over to play while his sister made her grand entrance. The two boys are so fun to watch when they're together!

Like his parents, William has taken to fudgesicles. Don't worry. They're Healthy Choice.

Prepping for summer W got some new swim duds and a frog pool for the back yard. It's a hit.

Thank goodness for Aunt Charity, who helped save mommy's sanity while Daddy was out of town for a bit.
Okay... look close. William carefully hunted and captured this caterpillar. He proudly showed me his prize with his fingers pinched tightly on the poor caterpillar's middle. I was so grossed out, but had run to get the camera. W had lost interest in his now non-mobile pet and had dropped it by the time I came back. Boys.


Another boy toy. Charity, William and I up and drove down to Southern Virginia on a quick day trip to visit my brother who was there before he took off on a submarine! This fun race car simulator was outside the Commissary.

My bro took us on a tour of the submarine! Oh my gosh. It's soooo cramped. This picture doesn't even do his "bed" justice on how itty bitty his living space is.

W was pretty terrified while we were in there. He had an iron grip on my shoulder most of the time. Towards the end of the little tour he started reaching for various knobs and valves in the hallways. Time for the end of the tour!

"Hmm. What's a 'lemon'?"
"Yuck! I think I'll stick with fudgesicles!" -see below
That's my boy! Yes! So... in order to clean up his sticky hands, I decided to fill up the frog pool...
which quickly became a whole body affair. So. Off came the soggy clothes...
Voila! Shoes were left on to protect from the stinkin' gravel "patio" which is now GONE.

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In more news! To the devoted (and possibly just bored) viewers... Today we found out that William is not only going to be a big brother, but he is going to be a big brother to a LITTLE BROTHER. We're so excited!
Profile shot of our very handsome second son.

hum drum

Our lives have gotten a lot more boring since we've been home. I love it. My blog fans may not, but I'm happy as a clam to have my days scheduled around nothing but naps, playdates, and the occasional lunch trip to costco. Our next trip out of town isn't scheduled until May! Fabulous.

Half the time W falls asleep while drinking a bottle and the other half he falls asleep in his crib talking to himself. When he does this we find him in some adorable positions after he's finally talked himself out.
After reading Cami's blog about her new handheld vac, the temptation was simply too great. We went out and got one. It was amazing. Within a day my car was clean and so were the stairs (both long overdue projects). Not only has our new friend been ever so handy in cleaning up after each of W's meals, but it seems to have become a favorite toy to W. All during breakfast today he was reaching for it. When he finally got his prized possession I took it away briefly to move it & him to the living room. Oh! The tears that flowed. Traumatic, I tell you. I think I can work this new friendship to my advantage though...

At Last

William's sleeping since my 'cry cry cry' post has been up and down. Shortly after the post I began weaning him to the bottle. When he finally realized that the bottle would actually give him milk whereas momma couldn't anymore- he took right to it. Quickly thereafter sleeping improved- getting up 2-3 times a night with the first stretch up to 5-7 hours. Then. Things went downhill. My sweet little darling began cutting molars! I wasn't expecting those until the rest of his top/bottom front teeth came in! Then he began cutting two more top teeth. So fun.
Regardless of all the new teeth, congestion, and fevers (that come with teeth) last night Monster slept from 7pm-5am! Granted, it would have been great if he'd have pushed back that wake up time an hour, but still! What a miracle. Did I sleep that whole time? No way. If William keeps this up then mommy will get to work on some sleep training of her own. I still haven't had the guts to let him 'cry it out', but I always held onto my (maybe overly optimistic, but seemingly realized) belief that he'd get there on his own. I just am hoping that last night wasn't a fluke!

Rain, Rain, GO AWAY.

I tell you what, this crummy weather better clear up soon or who knows what we might find next to pass the time!!

Daddy being a hero and finding a way to make William laugh during that rough hour before bedtime.

Birthday Weekend

We celebrated several birthdays this weekend! We celebrated William's, our friend Max's 2nd birthday, and Nathaniel's birthday! It was so fun to get to spend so much time with our friends. Here are a few pictures of the fun:

Max got a new ride for his birthday so he graciously lent William this fun car! He loves it!

I made William brownies for his birthday. Here he is testing out Daddy's cake. I think he liked it way better than the brownies. Smart kid.
Old man in action. I was short 6 candles and he still missed 3!
Nathaniel striking a silly pose with his new soccer ball and soccer birthday cake.

The birthday boy Part 2

I mentioned in the blog I posted earlier today that I would put up some more pictures. Here are some pictures from us playing this morning.

I forgot to mention that my ambitious child (must be Nathaniel's son) just decided to up and WALK this week. Here's the big guy in action:

Happy Birthday William

Oh my. William turns ONE today! I can't believe how quickly time has flown and how much he has changed in just one year. Happy birthday, big boy. Thank you for all you have taught us and all of the joy you have brought us.

one week old
1 day old
Who knew that in less than a year he'd transform from this ^ to this:
As part of the 'big boy' celebration we took William out to get his first haircut. Such a handsome guy! I'll get a picture of him after his nap today and add it so the new haircut can be witnessed.

cry, cry, cry

Anyone who has talked to us personally in the past several (or 12) months is well aware that our darling child is a rotten sleeper. A good night is him waking up 3 times. An average night is probably up 5 times. A wretched night is up 10+ times (though these can generally be blamed on teething or illness). The advice has long been offered "let him CRY." Even my sensitive husband a mere week or two after coming home from the hospital with our new bundle of joy asked me, "so when do we just let him cry?" My answer then and now still tends to be "not yet.". I know, I know it will take a 'few horrible nights and then he'll learn' and our 'nights will simply be heavenly'. I know. I just hate to hear my son cry. I hate walking in there when my stomach can't take any more and seeing tears streaming down his face and he's reaching out for me like I've abandoned him. I also know that sometimes, like this afternoon, a little cry is all he needs. Today for his afternoon nap I knew he needed to sleep and I think he knew he needed to sleep. Rocking and nursing had no effect so into the crib he went with my intention to return in 5 minutes. 2 minutes later he was silent and sound asleep. So what's the deal? Why will he sometimes cry for over 30 minutes in a full and brilliant drama-display and other times he wails for a moment and then is out cold? Maybe my timing is just wrong for day time naps sometimes. I think letting him cry at night will be an entirely different ballgame though. Do I just need to let him cry for 10...15...30 minutes and then go comfort him? I think he'd get more ticked if I checked on him right away and then disappeared again. Ooh the fun adventures of motherhood. I'll have to update soon, as the sleeping adventures continue. I need to snap out of my 1st trimester fatigue and snap into action to get my little love sleeping and weaned (that'll be fun too...).
Till next time...

My lil' tech savy child

William has figured out how to climb on top of the printer to reach the computers. And oooh the drama if the computers happen to be closed after his climbing efforts. What a silly little monkey I have on my hands!

Hop on the bandwagon

We're delighted to announce that baby #2 is due: September 30, 2008!

Too Funny

My dear friend Christie worked some photoshop magic to help one of Nathaniel's poses below to be all the more realistic!

Forgive us, faithful viewers

Okay... so, once again I'm fired. We're back though with our internet at our house up and running. Those last couple weeks in Germany I just ran out of steam and couldn't get myself to blog.
I wish I could fully write how fantastic it is to be HOME. I fell in love with our little house all over again, not even noticing it's little quirks (like the squeaky 4th step and bathroom floor, the toilet that runs, and a mysterious ticking noise coming from our closet...) until this week. It's wonderful to have cell phones so I can call my friends and family whenever I want. And, I've gotta admit- it's great to be back in Costco territory too. The only things that I really miss about Germany thus far are our friends and the word "Tchuss" that they use for "see ya" and always say in a sing-song kind of way.
Here are some pictures of our last 2-3 weeks in Germany:

This is Sammy. We got to watch him while his parents were in the hospital having Sammy's new brother Jack!
It was so funny to watch the boys interact. Mostly it was a lot of nonverbal "mine", "no! mine!"
To get the kids out of the house we went to see a nearby castle. (I can't remember the name right now!)


Nathaniel's mom came out to visit the week before we left. We took her out to see Heidleberg. This is Nathaniel doing his best impression of the statue. ;)

This time we took a tour of the castle. This picture is taken from where the moat once was, but then was built up into a library. The picture is of what was toilets before they added the library!
The castle prison, the "seldom empty."

We also took Julie to see the Gutenberg Bibles. Here Nathaniel is once again posing as the statue!

This is William 'helping' mommy pack! He has a particular fondness for hangers. The other day in the car he wouldn't let go of his hanger and so I just carried him into a restaurant with it but Daddy vetoed and took it away. He was afraid we'd look like white trash. haha.
Our last Sunday in Germany we spent with our good friends the Gentils. The girls are so much fun and we'll miss them so much!
Me and William with our good friends Teresa and Zadell (with baby Katherine). I miss them lots!