Father's Day Weekend

Kasey travelled to London last week so it was just me and my girl Myla Wednesday through Sunday. No surprise, we had a great time all weekend. On Thursday night I played volleyball so we tried out a new babysitter for the first time. In typical Myla fashion, she took one look at Jordan when she walked in and then looked at me and said "bye daddy!" It sounded like they got along fabulously.

On Friday morning, Myla and I woke up to a nice little present that Kasey left for us - a shirt that says "Daddy Does My Hair." Of course I had her wear it and I put her hair in pigtails for school that day. Several teachers commented on it.

On Friday night we survived a storm that rocked the area with 80 mph winds. We were lucky as many people were without power all weekend and many trees were knocked down. Other than a few small branches, we had little damage compared to some other people in the neighborhood as seen in these pictures:

Saturday morning we went for "dobbies" (aka donuts) and then came home and played with her water table on a very hot afternoon.

On Sunday morning we went to the zoo to check out the animals and just hang out:

This tiger was checking out Myla. Pretty cool how close we got!

We finished our weekend with a pool party! One of Kasey's coworkers also went to London this weekend, so her husband and I got together on Sunday afternoon and let the kids play in the pool and make a general mess of everything. Myla had a great time playing with David and Tess in their pool:

2nd Birthday Slide Show

Day 10 of the marathon! We'll finish up with a slide show from Myla's birthday party. Thanks so much to all of our family members who made the long trip to celebrate with us. Myla had a wonderful time with you all!

Click to expand.

Happy birthday to you!

Myla was much more into her birthday than I really thought she'd be. She loved having Happy Birthday sung to her, and she had practiced blowing out her candles. She couldn't get enough cake, or mac 'n cheese, or chips, or any of the other "special foods" she was allowed to get her fill of over the weekend. It was so fun to watch her enjoying it. Here's a video of her Happy Birthday moment.

(Fair warning: It gets a bit boring after the candle is blown out. I haven't figured out how to edit these videos).

New toys

Myla got some great toys for her birthday, including a couple for playing outside. Here are a couple of videos showing how much she loves them!

A playset with slide from Nana and Pop:

And a new bike from Grandma and Baw Baw. She can ride it like a big girl, but can also really get it going in rocking mode!

Check out this action shot of Matthew finishing his half marathon on Myla's birthday! His time was actually a couple of minutes faster than the 2:09 shown here.




We had lots of family in town for Myla's birthday, and everyone went down to watch Matthew finish. Here, Myla entertains Maria, Jonathan, Shelby, and Andrew while we waited.

After the race. Myla loved Matthew's medal and couldn't wait to show him her sign. We're proud of you, Matthew!

Sick

Unfortunately, Myla wasn't feeling well for most of Memorial Day weekend. On Sunday, she uncharacteristically fell asleep in the living room, well before her scheduled nap. As you fellow parents know, it's really awful when your kid is sick, but it also provides some really sweet snuggly moments.

Popsicles

After a trip to the playground with the Zumbiels, we were all ready for a cool treat. Here are the girls enjoying their popsicles--such a pure, simple pleasure! And you can see how well the girls were getting along here. They're going to have so much fun in the years ahead.

Zooin' it with the Zumbiels

Over Memorial Day weekend, Matthew's sister Jennifer and her family came to visit us. The girls had a great time together, and it was a surprisingly laid-back weekend. We started with a visit to the local zoo.

Megan has a snack on board the train.

Turtles!

The big girls in the petting zoo.

Love this one of Myla looking at the horses.

Walsh Family Visit

Earlier in May, our good friends the Walshes came to visit us from Chicago. Matthew and Ryan have been great friends since grade school, and our families are a lot alike--they have a daughter Sophia who is just a bit younger than Myla, and they're actually expecting another baby just before we are.

Sophia and Myla get along great. Here they are having fun in the bath together. I love this shot of Matthew and Ryan giving their little girls a bath. I'm sure they never saw this in their future when they were roaming the halls of Cov Cath back in the day!

Bucket Head

At my friend Stephanie's wedding last month, they had these great welcome baskets in the hotel rooms containing all things Kentucky. The basket itself was actually a Kentucky Fried Chicken bucket, which made its way home with us. For some reason, Myla loved it. She liked to put it on her head while she played "tea party," and say "Bucket head! Bucket head!" Totally cracked us up.

30,000 hits and more evidence of a new baby!

Yesterday our blog counter rolled past 30,000 visits! Thanks so much for continuing to support our blog and give us a reason to keep this great record of our growing family.


In celebration, we'll have a post every day for the next 10 days! We'll start with some more evidence that we actually are having another baby . . . this is me at 26 weeks (I'm now at about 29). Baby's cookin'!

Two years old!

Happy second birthday, Myla James! You have brought us immeasurable joy, fun, and love over the last two years. We love hearing what you have to say and watching you learn new things. You have amazing manners and a great attitude, and are generous with your sweet hugs and kisses. You make us so proud and we can't wait to see how you grow in the year ahead.

Here's Myla enjoying her favorite breakfast of doughnuts this morning (a.k.a. "dobbies"). Check back next week for lots of birthday pictures and other stuff from recent weeks!

Parenting angst. Over snow cones.

Myla's day care has started having the snow cone truck come by every Thursday to push their goodies on the kids. There have been signs up saying we could by "passes" so that she gets a snow cone every week, but I've been ignoring them on the grounds that she's two and doesn't need snow cones! Call me a scrooge, but they're messy and pure sugar, and did I mention that she's two? Anyway, I figured it wasn't a big deal, but we found out that she was one of only two kids in her class that didn't get a snow cone yesterday. Her teacher said she felt really bad for her. And now my heart is breaking thinking about her watching all the other kids eat snow cones when she didn't get one. So I guess we'll cave so she won't be left out.

Of course, I'm now worried about the kid who will be the only snow-cone-less child in the class. I want to buy him/her a pass, too. Incidentally, it's this same ridiculous instinct that makes me a Democrat. :)