Pictures!!!!

Yeah! We got our pictures that Julie Johnson took for us a couple of weeks ago. We are so excited. They turned out so good. She has such a natural style and captured our family playing together. Here is a small sample. Be sure to check out her website on our blog as well.

Aidan playing with his turtle.

Caleb would love to be a photographer and wanted to use Julie's camera.

Caleb helping Aidan to walk and Aidan loved it this time.

Aidan yelling, " I can do it myself!"

Caleb determined, "If you would just give me your left hand we could walk together."

Self-explanatory!

Boys Activities

I mentioned in our previous post that Aidan loves cake. Well it is not just chocolate cake he loves white cake too. One of the benefits have having a big family is the opportunity to celebrate birthdays multiple times. One of the benefits for Aidan is that means multiple opportunities for more cake! The picture below is after we told Aidan no more cake at a birthday party shared with Joe and Courtney. The green actually did come off and didn't permanently stain! :)

Caleb this week was given his first "Big Boy" puzzle. You know one not made out of wood, but one that comes in a box. His first puzzle is a picture of 2 airplanes. He is ecstatic. On Saturday morning he woke me up at 6:30 to play puzzles and has done so everyday since. He is a lot like is Great-Grandma Elsie who also loved to do puzzles. It is so fun to see the tradition carry on. Grammy, be ready when we come back to Chicago this one is ready for some puzzles!

So we have now entered the time of life where the boys enjoy playing together. We found that while we are cooking in the kitchen that they want to play together, so of course when you are their size where is the best place to play in the kitchen? Check out the video below!

The Summer of Travel

So as stated on our first post 2 months ago life was speeding up and definitely sped up. We can't believe that we are halfway through our summer already.

The trip to San Diego that was on the horizon occurred and went from one week there to four weeks. The kids had a blast with being so close to the ocean. Caleb went from being chased by the waves to chasing the waves and surfing. Aidan went from hating the sand to rolling around in it. Aidan also began to like being in the waves. James and I also very much enjoyed being in the beautiful weather and the ability to be outside with feeling like we were in a sauna.

My work as of today finally slowed down a little, although we have another trip back to Southern Cali the middle of August. I am looking forward to a few weeks at home with out the stress at work.

James finished up his two classes for the spring and enrolled in two more for the fall. He is enjoying some time off of hard core school although he is working through a couple of independent study bible courses. He is also looking forward to remodeling our master bath due to our bathtub breaking last weekend.

We also this summer took a week and went to Chicago to visit Mom and Steve over the 4th. We had a blast hanging out in the pool, food and conversation. We also enjoyed going to the Taste of Chicago. The below pic is from the center park area of the Taste. I highly recommend this if you've never been. We decided we want to try and do something like this every year. Next year we are thinking of the VP fair in St. Louis.

Aidan turned 1 this month and we discovered he LOVES cake. He will eat as much as you give to him. He loves following Caleb around and playing with balls. I think he will be our sports fanatic. He is not full force walking yet, but he has taken a few steps by himself here and there.

Caleb has discovered that he likes to swim, although with our travels no swim lessons have been had, the hotel in Cali and Mom's pool have convinced him that it is fun. He has started to make up his own songs and will be found walking around singing during the day. He also loves cars and wants to go golfing with Daddy.

That is all for now.

Hope everyone enjoys the rest of the summer.