Segways

When Uncle Bob and Aunt Valeta were in town, I finally got my chance to go on Segway tour and wear a coveted pink helmet. If you'll recall, I was pregnant last Summer when everyone else went.

Juju also missed out on the last trip. We started the night by practicing in the alley next to the Segway Tour headquarters. That's Megan, our fearless tour guide.

She took this picture of us all in front of White House.

I took this picture while riding on my segway. Which was a scary thing to do.

By the time we got to the Lincoln Memorial, we were so tired, we had to lie down on it!

We were sweaty too but having a lot of fun!

Then we rode down the Mall to the Capitol Building. Where romance blossoms.

Since it was getting dark out...

We snagged one more picture and headed home.*

*Where a little baby girl was screaming her head off because she refused to take the bottle I left for her! A million thanks to Fix for enduring an hour+ of screaming so I could have three hours of segway fun!

Big Brothers, Little Siblings

Juju wanted to meet Martin, so a week after he was born, we drove up to the Hathaways and brought them some lunch.

I put Rock and Louisa in their Big Brother/Little Sister outfits not knowing that Aiden would be wearing his Big Brother shirt too! And what a good big brother Aiden is to Sophie, Clip and Martin!

Rock might need to take a few lessons from him. You see, usually Rock is super sweet to his baby sister.

But occasionally, he is a punk.

And that makes her furious! Appreciate how he looks so thoroughly pleased with himself for inciting such a pitiful response.

Sleeping in is not a sin.

Sleeping through the night is not yet a nightly activity. But often when Louisa gets up during the night, Daddy takes Rock in the morning so Louisa and I can 'sleep in' until around 8:30 or so.This picture makes me think of...

This picture. Same bed, same clock, same white attire, same bedding. Different kid, different parent, differentpaint, different adorable chunkiness.

Laundry

No wonder I never get anything done.

Molly

Molly makes Louisa smile.

Molly makes Rock smile.

Not sure about this one.

Growing Again

For Mother's Day, Fix went to www.blurb.com and put the first year of this blog into a fabulous photo album for me.

Now that we've got the hard copy, Rock loves looking through it to find...

This picture from a December 2007 blog post.

Of course then he wanted to recreate the photo.

Before we know it, he'll fit into pants this big. But thinking about that makes me sad so we won't think about that.

Bouncer

Lately Louisa's loving the bouncer. That is as long as she can see one of us from where she's sitting. Try and leave her alone for one minute and she freaks out.

Here she had to share her seat with Baby Addy.

Guess who came up with that idea.

Martin Seth Hathaway

On June 4th, my best friend Annie had her fourth baby, Martin Seth Hathaway at Howard County Hospital. When her first son Aiden was born there, I went and saw him on the day he was born. When her second son Clip was born there, I saw him on the day he was born. So of course, I had to go see Martin on the day he was born.*

After I got to hold him and stare at his adorable cuteness for a long time (but not long enough!)...

Fix brought the kiddies up from the car so they could meet and hold Martin.

Martin was named after Marty, Annie's dad -- just like Rock was named after Rock, my dad.

Annie and I were both convinced she was having a girl and had planned for Louisa to be her best friend. Now that we know it's a boy, we have planned for them to get married. And I guess they can be best friends too 'cause it's always a good idea to marry your best friend. Anyway, doesn't Annie look beautiful for just having a baby?! CONGRATS to the whole Hathaway family and welcome baby Martin!

** You read that right, Annie has FOUR kids but Sophie, her daughter (#2 in birth order) was born while they were in Seminary in St. Louis and I was living in California with Fix 'cause he was in Seminary out there! So unfortunately, I couldn't come to see her on the day she was born!

Tummy Torture

The beautiful quilt from Missy has now become Louisa's torture device. Per the doctor's orders, we give her tummy time twice a day for 15 minutes. She hates it. And she usually falls asleep around 14.5 minutes -- right when I'm about to rescue her from her distress. Poor girl. It's tough work strengthening those neck muscles!

Silly Skier

Rock makes us laugh. A lot.

He found my 3D glasses from when Fix and I saw Avatar and started posing in front of the doorknob.

"Look Mommy! I'm skiing!"

Those are his letter flashcards.

Cars

Have you met Rock's best friends?

I am confident that we've heard the question "Wanna play cars and trucks wif me?" over a million times this year. It is usually the first phrase out of Rock's mouth in the morning and we spend at least a small portion of everyday with the cars from Radiator Springs.

Shortly after these pictures were taken he acquired Sally (thank you Juju) and Mack (thank you Annie) and his obsession with "the cars with eyes" has reached an all-time high.

WHIRLYVID

I don't know about your house, but in our house everyone is talking about whirlyvids -- the revolutionary new genre of film portraits. If you haven't heard of them, head over to my friend Nelson Pewitt's blog:

http://whirlyvid.blogspot.com

You will not be disappointed.

The ULTIMATE Ultimate Crib Sheet

Before Rock was born, my friend Lynn highly recommended the Ultimate Crib Sheet. So, my mom bought the one above as a gift for Rock. But when Louisa came along, Juju wisely realized that we couldn't possibly let a baby girl sleep on a sheet embroidered in BLUE!!!**

Instead, she asked our family friend Lauren to customize a crib sheet just for Little Lou!

Thank you so much Lauren! Louisa loves it almost as much as I do!
**For the record, we don't worry too much about the whole girls-can't-do-blue thing so I'm perfectly happy to let Louisa sleep on the ultimate crib sheet embroidered in BLUE... and the two other ultimate crib sheets that don't have any embroidery. Especially when this one needs to be washed.

May Vacay: Day Eight

Our final day of vacation began with Maisie and Louisa bonding on the floor.

Of course, whenever attention was lavished on the young babes, the older babes came running to get some attention of their own.

Although he claims he wants to learn to play the piano, Rock was very smitten with Geneva's guitar. After one final tune, we headed home -- exhausted and happy from a fun week of play. Thanks again to Will and Christel for hosting us and feeding us (VERY well!) over the holiday weekend!

May Vacay: Day Seven

After church on Sunday, we got a bite to eat.

Will, Fix, Robert and Louisa = one half of the Mothership men and one Mothership babe.

Rock and Louisa took a nap on Robert's bed before we went up to his rooftop to get a view of the city. I would have taken pictures up there but I was a nervous wreck thinking that the kids would be able to climb over the 4-5' wall and plummet to their death.

Rock and Geneva beat the heat in their mother's sunglasses.