CM Photography

Cody took possession of my camera yesterday and had a grand old time taking pictures around the house. It's really cool to see life from his perspective, and his pictures aren't half-bad! Like this one! ;)


Remember those magazine puzzles where they would show an extreme close-up of an object and you had to guess what it was? Many of Cody's shots remind me of those.


Cody snapped a few pictures of people, too!


Luke really wanted to have a camera too, so I let him play with my old one. He was very proud of it.


If he stays interested, we may have to get him a camera of his own for his birthday to protect my Nikon. How fun to have another photographer in the family!

Happy 4th of July!

The boys have been so excited about seeing real fireworks this year, so we decided to head down to KaboomTown on Friday night. We didn't actually go all the way to Addison where all the festivities are, we just found a parking lot on Midway just north of the Addison airport (where they launch the fireworks from) and settled in. There were already crowds of people when we got there so we figured we'd found a good spot, especially since the parking lot also featured a Wendy's.

The boys had brought pillows and blankets, so we put the seats down in the back of the Suburban and got comfortable.


We also had a bunch of glowsticks from the Dollar Spot at Target, so we gave those a whirl.

We enjoyed the mini-Airshow of classic bombers and army planes flying overhead in various formations, but when it was time for the fireworks, it turned out we couldn't see them! So we hopped in the car, drove just a bit further south, and found another vantage point to watch from. The boys seemed to like it, though they were all exhausted by the time we headed home.

It took us about 45 minutes to escape the traffic and get back to the house, and when Anthony and I turned around as we pulled into the garage, we saw this:

Guess we wore them out! ;)

The next morning, we hit the Plano Independence Day Parade. It was super close to our house and only about 45 minutes long, so it was just right for us.

Look, another Cody wink picture!

Luke borrowed Cody's hat for some shade.


Cody just used Daddy.We had a great holiday. Happy 4th!

Luke at 20 Months

I have often said that each of my 3 boys brings a special organ to the body of our family: Jackson is the brain, Cody is the heart, and Luke is the mouth (ok, I don't think the mouth is really an organ, but whatever). My little peanut is quite a talker/screamer/yeller/, and he has one heck of a sweet tooth, too.

I made a list way back at the beginning of this blog of all of Cody's words at 20 months. Cody talked more and sooner than Jackson, but Luke, as the mouth, has both of them beat. He's saying all sorts of words that I wouldn't guess many 20 month-olds know (the fun of big brothers, I suppose) like "awesome" and "Spongebob." And he says a bunch of 2 and 3-word phrases, although it must be said that his favorite word is still NO. ;)

Luke's List

Mama
Daddy (this can refer to Anthony or any FJ Cruiser we see on the road)
Jacks
Codes
Gramma
Spongebob ("Bob-Bob")
car
truck
beep-beep
juice
cup
banana
hot
boo-boo
snack
trash
shoes (said in manner of pre-teen Valley girl at the mall)
dude
uh-oh
bubbles
book
ball
guitar
dance
clap
poop (cue the big brothers chortling with glee)
hello
bye-bye
night-night
please
no
move (said "mooooooooooooove" to someone in his way)
on
off
dog
woof
cat
meow
moo
baby
mine
stuck
yahoo/yay/yippee
awesome ("aw-shom")
come on (while dragging someone with him wherever he wants to go)
all gone
love you ("ee-yoo" when one of us is leaving the house) **

**this one is my favorite

It can only be considered ironic that last night, on the eve of my post about Luke's mouth, he fell off the bottom step of our pool ladder and bit through his lip. The bleeding stopped pretty quickly but we made the trip to Acute Kids anyway, just in case, where they applied some skin glue to help the little bite marks heal.

What organ corresponds with courage? Or perhaps, more accurately, the total absence of fear? Because Luke is a little daredevil with seemingly no sense of self-preservation. He climbs, he jumps, he runs full-tilt...in short, he scares years off my life, daily. And though I'm aging prematurely as a result, I have to say I admire his total readiness to jump into anything and everything. His older brothers and I all tend to be more cautious and wary about trying new things. Luke will give anything a whirl at least once. He won't miss out on things, that's for sure. I might prefer he miss out on the ER visits, but it definitely keeps things interesting.

Ee-yoo, Peanut! You're totally aw-shom!

Why I love my boys...right this minute

1) I just put Luke to sleep for nap by singing the night-night song for the entire cast of SpongeBob Squarepants (ie., "Night-Night Plankton, Night-Night Plankton...")

2) Cody wanted to go to Wendy's for lunch because he loves the "frosting"

3a) Jacks came out of the Burger King play area when he saw me carrying 3 chocolate milks and my soda and said, "Can I help?"

AND

3b) He's up in his room listening to Disc 1 of Michael Jackson's HIStory album right now. He is SO excited about music lately. I think he really digs Nickelback and Linkin Park. God help me.

:)

Happy 7th Birthday Jackson!

It's hard to believe that our biggest little man is now 7 years old! He had a great day on Friday. We started off the morning with cinnamon rolls, and he headed to summer camp wearing his new watch (he begged to open just one present before he left).

Then when Cody, Luke and I came to pick him up, we had turned the Suburban into a "BirthdayMobile." We painted the windows with little messages and filled the inside of the car with balloons. He LOVED it! He climbed in with the biggest smile on his face. Of course, he said, "This is weird!" while giggling, but when I asked him if he liked it, he said, "YES!"


Cody did a good job keeping our plan to decorate the car a secret until we picked Jacks up. Wink, wink!

That night, Jacks got to choose when we went for dinner, and he chose Chuy's. We let the waiter know when we first arrived that we had a birthday in our party, so after our meal, he came over with a sombrero for Jackson, some birthday sopapillas, and a group of other servers to sing to our guy. I thought Jacks would be very embarrassed, but he seemed to love it.


On Saturday morning, Jackson had a baseball game before his birthday party. And guess what? At that game, he got his first hit of the whole season. Yippee!!

Then, it was on to Adventure Landing for some fun in the arcade, miniature golf, GoKarts and bumper boats. We were lucky to have Aunt Beth visiting from Houston for the occasion, and she kept Cody company throughout the party so he wouldn't feel left out. I think he likes her. A lot.


Jacks chose a Wall-E cake. It was pretty yummy!


Holy cow, it was HOT out there. The kids all had a great time, but we were all slightly melted by the time we were done. Jacks invited just 4 classmates and it was a really fun, sweet group.


Jacks loves the ladies. And they love him!


Even Luke played a bit of golf with Grandma.

See those red cheeks? I told you it was hot!!


The whole gang!


Aunt Beth and Cody enjoyed the bumper boats! And Jacks and his friends went for a spin, as well.


Right at the end, Cody decided he wanted to try the Jr. GoKarts. I was a bit worried he'd get in and freak out, but he did great! Look at that concentration!

It was a great party, a great weekend, and a great birthday for Jacks. He really enjoyed the Legos he received, and we went to the Lego store yesterday so he could spend his birthday money and a gift card, too. He's also looking forward to loading up his new MP3 player. ;)

Happy Birthday Jackson! We love you!

Pool Fun

We finally have our own pool set up! We had to have our landscaper come out and level the ground for us, but it's up and full and it works. Yippee!

The boys just could not wait to get in, so we did a little swimming yesterday while the pool was still filling. At our friends' house last week, Luke wouldn't go in the water. But yesterday, he liked our pool because at the beginning, he could touch the bottom. It remains to be seen how he reacts today with the water level much higher. But he was actually enjoying floating a little bit yesterday too, in his own little ring, and then also sharing with big brother. :)

They asked to get in the pool first thing this morning. I'm really hoping they continue to be so excited about it and that we spend a lot of time out there. Pool party at our house!