Monday, December 31, 2007

Dee-troit Basketball!!!!





Santa brought us tickets for the Detroit Pistons so that is how we spent New Years Eve. It was a fun game - they won by 40 points. Joey had so much fun, but he was afraid of the pyrotechnics at the beginning when they introduced the players. I think it just took him by surprise and freaked him out because you could feel the heat from the fire all the way up in the second level where we were. He laughed and laughed when everybody yelled "Dee-troit Basketball" and he also loved booing the ref for bad calls - he thought that was funny too.
I had fun trying to get pictures of the players with my new camera. The picture of them lined up for the National Anthem turned out pretty good.

Saturday, December 22, 2007

What Kind of Christmas Tree are You?




You Are a Cranberry and Popcorn Strung Tree



Christmas is all about showcasing your creative talents.

From cookies to nicely wrapped presents, your unique creations impress everyone.

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Oh Christmas Tree



Last weekend we finally got the tree up and decorated. Joey loved hanging ornaments (there seem to be a lot of ornaments on the bottom compared to the rest of the tree!)

Decorating Christmas cookies


Last week we made and decorated our cut out Christmas cookies. Joey has been having so much fun with it - I think he ate more icing than what ended up on the cookies.

Monday, December 03, 2007

Joey's "No-Man" - it's all fun and games until someone loses an arm!

Joey has been wanting to build a snowman (or as he says, "no-man". Finally, this weekend we got a lot of snow up at the lake. Here is the finished product:

Unfortunately, Honey loves to chew on sticks that she finds in the snow, as you can see she is eyeing the "no-man's" arm:

Here he is chasing Honey trying to get No-man's arm back:

Sunday, December 02, 2007

A boy and his baby doll AKA future blackmail photos


Joey forgot his teddy bear when we stayed at Grandma's on Thanksgiving, so Grandma found this old doll baby. Joey got so attached to her that he even wanted his hair to look like her.

Monday, October 22, 2007

Captain Feathersword on the Ghost Train





The weekend before last we went to the "Ghost Train" at Huckleberry Railroad in Flint. Joey looked so cute in his Captain Feathersword outfit (his friend Emma was a giraffe and mommy was "scary old witch"):

Thursday, October 18, 2007

Great Response to Anderson Cooper

For anyone who saw Anderson Cooper's over sensationalized report on Guatemalan adoptions, this is a really good response from a hopeful adoptive parent:

http://andersoncooperhatesme.blogspot.com/


Sunday, October 07, 2007

Swimming in Lake Huron in October




Today was in the 80s again so, instead of going apple picking or to the pumpkin patch like we originally had planned, we went swimming. Joey has been asking about swimming in this warm weather, but the pools are closed, so we went up to Port Huron. There were so many people there swimming it looked like a summer day. The water was still pretty warm too. Another weird thing was that the water was so low - there was a big sandbar actually sticking out of the lake. The kids were all playing on it and Joey had so much fun finding rocks to take over there to build a pile.

Tuesday, May 15, 2007

Dancing with Mommy

On Mothers' Day we went on the Nautica Queen in Cleveland with Grandma and "Papa". They had a dance floor and Joey actually broke out some of his moves that he usually only practices in private.

Saturday, March 31, 2007

Easter egg hunt and the "Easter Duck"

Our city's Easter egg hunt was today. Here is a picture of Joey at the "starting line" ready for action:



Here he is with his stash of eggs. Each kid was supposed to stop at five eggs, but how do you tell a two year old that? We kept tossing a few out as he went along, but we still ended up with eight.



Finally, we went to see the Easter Bunny, they had three stations set up. Two were Easter Bunnies and one was the "Easter Duck". I was a little bit disappointed that we got the duck instead of the bunny, but Joey actually loved the duck. He has been talking about the duck all day.

Friday, March 30, 2007

Three Little Monkeys

This is a little movie I made from a clip I took of the boys jumping on Grandma's bed a few weeks ago.

Wednesday, March 21, 2007

A real guitar!!

We really are trying not to spoil Joey since he is an only child, so we don't usually just buy new toys for no reason. But, he has been walking around saying "I want a guitar" for a few weeks, so I broke down and bought a kiddie guitar on Ebay.

You can see by the smile on his face how excited he was:




And here he is jamming to a U2 song that was on TV - I think we have a future rocker on our hands:

Friday, March 16, 2007

Funny stories from our day

I took Joey to the child care center at our gym today so that I could work out. He, of course, cried pitifully when I left him. When I came back, though, they had the Wiggles playing on the big TV. He was standing up in front of all of the other kids dancing and doing all of the hand motions to the song. When he saw me, he barely acknowledged me and just kept on dancing. Finally I coaxed him out by promising that we could watch the Wiggles at home.

On the way home he started yelling, "Eat! Eat!". I was hungry too, so I decided to stop at Wendy's. He was being pretty good while I ordered because he was staring at their display case of toys. All of a sudden I heard a big commotion and turned around. He had somehow dismantled the whole toy display case and it fell down with all of the toys. Someone had to come out from behind the counter and take the broken display case away. I was so embarrassed!

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

More Wiggly Dancing!

Joey got a new toy in the mail today from Aunt Angie - a Wiggles keyboard! Here he is having a little jam session:

Monday, March 05, 2007

"I want cake!"

Joey usually seems to want to talk as little as he possibly can. He will use single words or even single syllables if he can get his point across. So, today out of the blue he decides to talk in full sentences! After dinner, I said to Dave "Oh I forgot we have leftover cake" and Joey said "I want cake!" clear as day. Then he repeated it "I want cake!" It was so funny. It makes me feel better because I was starting to worry a little bit that he would never talk.

Sunday, March 04, 2007

Another Birthday Celebration

Today we had our family party for Joey. He had a lot of fun playing with his cousins and he loved his Wiggles cake that Mommy made. (Actually I just bought a cake from Costco and stuck a Wiggles car on top!).


Wednesday, February 28, 2007

A full day of birthday fun!

Joey is two today! He had pancakes for breakfast and Mommy let him drink out of his cup without a lid (something he always wants to do):





Then we went to Rainforest Cafe for lunch:




He got to play in the play area with his friend Emma (or as he calls her - Elmo!)





Then, after a tiny melt-down and nap, we went to the Grand Azteca Mexican Restaurant. The waiters played the guitar and maracas and sang "Happy Birthday" and "Feliz Cumpleanos". Joey loved it and he really loved the flan that they brought him for dessert.



Although he got his big present over the weekend (his tricycle), he had a few books to open. Wiggles books!! Perfect for a bedtime story, then off to bed.



Sunday, February 25, 2007

Wiggle-Mania

Joey was extra excited today when we put his Wiggles DVD in so I had to go grab the camera. I have no idea what he is yelling.

Sunday, February 18, 2007

Disney!!




We had a great time at Disney World last week. Our first day at the parks was Sunday and we went to Epcot. Joey loved the Nemo ride. It was really cool because they reflect the pictures of Nemo and the other cartoon characters into the real aquarium. He also loved looking at the aquariums. He kept running up to the windows pointing and yelling "what is that??". He didn't want to leave. He also rode the "Living with the Land" boat ride and the Maelstrom ride in Norway, both of which were a little scary, but he didn't seem to mind. We took a break for a nap, but went back for the fireworks.

On Monday morning, it was rainy, but we went to the Magic Kingdom anyway. It was pretty crowded that day, but we went on a lot of rides: Winnie the Pooh, Peter Pan, the spinning Tea Cups (the Mad Hatter and Alice were riding at the same time!). Joey's favorite ride was "A Small World". He smiled the whole way through it and waved to all of the dolls. He also liked the Mickey Mouse 3-D movie and even kept his glasses on.

On Tuesday, they were calling for storms, so we stayed at our condo and swam (it was really warm that morning). We timed things perfectly since the storm hit during Joey's naptime and then we went to the Magic Kingdom for more rides and the fireworks show. Joey rode the Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Carribean. One of his favorite things about the parks were the parking trams that took you to your car. He would yell "toot toot" whenever he would see one. We probably could have saved a lot of money by just letting him ride the parking tram all day instead of buying tickets for the Disney Parks.

On Wednesday, we went to MGM Studios. We didn't like that park very well. We did go on the Movie Ride and the Backlot Tour, but we timed things poorly so that we missed most of the shows. We did see the Muppet 3-D movie, but it wasn't very good. We came home early and did some more swimming. Joey loved the pool at the condo and he is really trying to swim.

On Thursday, we went to Animal Kingdom. It was really a chilly day (at least by Florida standards!), but the animals seemed to be active because of it. The safari ride was really fun and Joey loved pointing at all of the animals that he saw. He also liked the trails, especially the one that went past the tigers. There was just a piece of glass between the tigers so we could really see them. Joey liked roaring at them. That night we went to the town of Celebration to walk around and we went to the Cuban restaurant, Columbia's. It was very good.

On Friday, we decided that we were "Disneyed out". We went to the Mall at Millenia and the Cheesecake Factory. The food and cheesecake was awesome. I wish they would build one in Detroit!

Our trip home was pretty rough. We had to leave our condo at about 8:00 to make the 3 hour drive to Jacksonville. We were supposed to fly to Cincinnati and then to Detroit. As we were getting ready to board our flight, my cellphone rang. It was Northwest airlines telling us that the flight from Cincinnati to Detroit had been cancelled and they had us scheduled on a flight the next day! We quickly got on the phone with Northwest and got switched to a later direct flight to Detroit, but that meant spending most of the day in the Jacksonville airport (the flight ended up being delayed an additional 1/2 hour). Joey was pretty good considering the circumstances and when our plane finally took off, he fell asleep for most of the flight.

Our basement


Here is a picture of our basement now that it has been painted. It is actually starting to look like a room.

Wednesday, January 24, 2007

Finally used our sled!

We bought a sled back in November and never got a chance to use it with the mild winter we are having. Tonight we finally had some snow accumulation, so we went to a park that has a few hills and tried it out. Joey was such a daredevil! He would laugh the whole way down the hill. Then he would lay down flat on the sled (luge style) and let us pull him back up the hill. At one point he decided it would be fun to run down the hill and he almost made it to the bottom before falling face first. He still came up smiling. I can't believe I forgot my camera! I haven't been sledding in years and had almost forgotten how fun it is (and how much exercise it is). That is the great thing about kids, they do keep you young! If we didn't have this little guy, we never would have been out there sledding after dark on a cold cold night.