Fourth of July Weekend - Part 2!

On Saturday, Chris's mom and Uncle John came to visit us and stayed until Sunday. We had a nice time visiting and the boys loved the extra attention! We played outside quite a bit, ordered Chinese takeout for dinner, went to the water fountain park, and Chris & I even got the deck stained! It was a busy couple of days! Here are some pictures from the visit...

Again, running through the sprinkler was lots of fun for Andy!

Of course, whoever is running through with Andy also ends up getting cooled off a little bit too! Here is Great Uncle John with Andy.
Bailey was happy to run around with Andy, but then decided to relax a little bit on the deck. Good news for Bailey this week - he had been diagnosed with a bad case of Lyme Disease in January (his antibody level was at 780 in January - the highest the vet had ever seen) He just got it rechecked and the vet wanted to see it down below 400 - it was down to 80!!! We were thrilled, and he is pretty much completely cured! We think he was just having some joint pain when he was diagnosed - it didn't get bad enough to have kidney or heart problems, thank goodness.
And here is Great Uncle John with Jack.Andy and Jack with their Grandma Reinsel. Andy was loving getting his new Diego books read to him - and was doing the actions that went along with the story really well! (stomping his feet, banging on the drum, and swimming with his arms)

We had to go back to our new favorite place - the water fountain park. We went pretty early in the morning, so we had it all to ourselves! I think Andy actually missed having other kids to run around with though.

And, at our neighborhood park, Andy enjoyed swinging and even went down the biggest slide by himself.

Bailey was being very well behaved and sat patiently on the bench while we played :)

And Jack was also very patient - just hanging out with Grandma Reinsel while Andy was playing.

8 WEEK UPDATE!!!

Well, on the morning that Jack was 8 weeks old (on Sunday) he was breaking out some HUGE smiles for me. He was in a good mood because he had slept from 8:30 until 1:30, and then all the way until 6:15!! Thus, I was also in a very happy mood too after getting lots of sleep :) We had some one on one time together for about a half an hour, until Chris and Andy got up too.

Jack is also talking a lot more - just cooing away, especially when his toys are hanging above him while he is laying down on his back.

And, here is a picture I forgot to post from Friday that shows Andy working with his tools on the pretend doghouses for Bailey and Teddy. Notice the work glove on his hand and goggles around his neck. He takes his work very seriously.

It's a pretty quiet week for us this week - no big plans, which is kind of nice. We're anxiously awaiting news from my brother Ryan and his wife Marianne - their baby is due any day! Jack and Andy get to have their first cousin, and Chris and I get to be an uncle and aunt for the first time!

Fourth of July Picnic

Although our Fourth of July was not filled with firecrackers, we still had a great day on Friday! My parents, Brad, and Karissa came up to visit, which was lots of fun. Actually, Brad and Karissa came up the night before and we were able to play some board games after the kids went to bed. Andy bonded with his Aunt Kari some more, and they were building pretend dog houses for Teddy and Bailey with his tools. I didn't get a pic of Karissa sporting the work goggles and gloves, but Andy sure was getting a kick out of it! On Friday, we grilled out (great job at the grill Chris!) and had a nice time visiting.
Here's a pic of Jack with his Grandma and Grandpa Graham. Check out that patriotic color coordination!
And Brad and Karissa out on the deck... They are excited to be in the process of buying their first home and we're wishing them lots of luck!

Here we are trying to get a family photo. Unfortunately, Andy isn't too much into the posed pictures lately so he did not really cooperate!

So here's a shot of us with Jack! (Again, look at that red, white, and blue. We didn't really plan it - the boys just had special shirts for the occasion!)

We have found a new board game that is lots of fun (Ticket To Ride) and has been added to our list of faves which include Settlers of Catan and Carcassonne. Karissa and I were somewhat handicapped for part of the game when Jack was eating and Andy decided he wanted to try to play too. Chris and I are excited for when we can start playing board games with Andy (and with Jack too eventually!)

And, happily, it got warm enough on Friday to break out the sprinkler. Andy was pretty psyched to be using his Diego sprinkler.

Andy also loves using his little spray bottle - his "sprayer" and has amazingly accurate aim from as far as 10-15 feet with it! So, you'll probably get a little bit wet if you're outside with him when he's playing with it!

At some point, the shorts got a litte bit too wet and started falling off so we decided that he didn't really need them!

He was having fun with Uncle Brad running through the sprinkler...

And trying to drink some of the water...

I fell a little behind in the last couple of weeks with posts, so here are some additional pics from before that I couldn't resist posting.

I love these pajamas on Jack. Here he is getting kind of sleepy...

One of the fun things that Andy has enjoyed while I've been on maternity leave is getting to go to the Milwaukee Zoo a couple of times... In the most recent visit, his favorite part was looking at the big fish and sharks. He would get really close to the glass and say "It's like I'm a swimmer" I think he felt like he was right in there with them!This big jaguar (or leopard?) was pacing back and forth right in front of the glass. We thought it looked like the jaguar on Go Diego Go!
Of course, riding the milk truck was a big hit with Andy again! Jack and I even got to drive for awhile.
And, no trip to the zoo is complete without a ride on the zoo train! Jack dozed through it, and Andy had some snacks.

This was the first time that Andy was really comfortable and enjoyed the carosel. Usually he is quite nervous, but since we were riding on the bench - and buckled in - he had fun and wanted to ride it again!

And lastly, Andy has been having lots of fun building forts with blankets. He usually pretends that he is on a spaceship and he is a spaceman driving to Mars. But, othertimes, we are just driving to Applebee's! He's got quite the imagination which is so fun to see!

Smiles!!!

Well, you've all seen Andy smiling plenty of times, but we've started catching a few of Jack's smiles on camera. Unfortunately it's usually right when he is waking up in the morning at 6 that he is smiliest (and I haven't been awake enough to have the camera ready!) But here are some pics of our happy guy! I'll post more fourth of July pictures later :)

Summer is definitely here!

The end of June was nice and warm, so the kids were enjoying some time in the heat! Jack is doing very well - he even slept 5 hours in a row for us one night last week! He's getting bigger, as the pictures below will show you! He's starting to smile at us when we talk to him, which is so sweet. He loves our ceiling fans and he is also noticing his colorful toys more.He's been losing some of the hair he was born with (so sad!) but now some more fuzz is coming back in again.

He's pretty mellow and serious most of the time. He put up with this little photo shoot very nicely!

Here he is doing some tummy time - he's getting his head off of the ground pretty easily now.

A mini-smile captured on camera! Definitley not a full grin, but he's working on it.

He's also noticing his hands more and likes to try to put them in his mouth and suck on them.

Andy had fun at yet another park this week! Here he is trying to go down the stairs instead of the slide.

And he LOVES getting dizzy. This thing spins around, and just watching him use it makes me so nauseous! I don't know how kids can go so fast around and around without getting sick!

We also discovered a park in Neenah that has a water fountain that kids can run and play in. Andy was tentative at first but then absolutely loved it.

He loved it so much that he asked daddy to take him back to it when Chris got home from work! He was so cute when he was asking, that we couldn't resist. Here's a picture of the fountain - he stayed away from the big middle spray - that's just for big kids, according to him.

He got bolder as he got more comfortable there, and soon he was running around with other kids chasing him (and then him chasing other kids!) He started singing "Doo doo doo doo, You can't get me! You can't get me!" That was in reference to the big sprays of water from the top fountain - when that fountain would spray him, from kids playing on it, he would laugh so hard and then run some more!

At another park, Andy was enjoying the climbing wall. And here we are at the top!

We're looking forward to the Fourth of July weekend - although I doubt if we will go to any fireworks with Andy and Jack! Or with Bailey - the fourth of July always brings back bad memories for him... he was lost overnight a few years ago on the fourth when he got so scared from the loud fireworks and ran away. We were so lucky to find him the next morning, but he was pretty shaken up. Sometimes we can see some fireworks from our house, so that will be the plan!

Happy Fourth of July!!!!