my little bug

I can't take credit for this photo. A photographer friend, who is more along the lines of an artist, took it. I love it how it captures Bug's joyful spirit.

family

Little Bug drew her first people this week! I love those long legs and tufts of hair some of them have. She said it was a family, with a daddy, who went to work, and a mama who stayed home with the little girl and baby. And do you see how the mama is 'holding' the baby?

the world outside

Tank will often go to our back glass doors and just stare out them. I think he is planning an escape.

a very merry unbirthday

Grandma Kristin mailed Little Bug an Ariel candle for fun the other week. Little Bug immediately insisted that we make a birthday cake. We then had to light the candle and sing happy birthday, except we sang the ABC's because it wasn't a real birthday. Oh, we love our Bug.

And so I will never forget, here is another Bug story.

The other day while eating lunch, Little Bug was looking at her alphabet place-mat and noticed that she was almost through learning her letters.  We do a little preschool each morning and work on a letter a week. Currently, we are on letter X. Here is the conversation that followed:

Little Bug: "Oh! I am almost done learning all my letters. Then, I will be done with school forever!"
(She does enjoy her preschool, so I don't know why she was excited to think it was ending.)

Me: "Well...you are going to be in school for a long time. There are lots and lots of things to learn."

Little Bug: "Yeah you're right, I still just don't know about hot air balloons."

I love when we get a glimpse into this little girls brain.

pit stop

Little Bug is so good to keep her brother replenished.

Tank

The other day, as Tank was pulling himself up into standing position on the couch, Andrew commented how we have not taken a picture of Tank in a while.  We have lots of Little Bug through her early stages, but not so many of Tank. This is probably common for second children, but it still made me a bit sad. I often have pleasant, nostalgic moments looking at pictures of Little Bug. So, before it is too late, here is our Tank at 9 months old.

Some stuff about our little guy:

• He seems to be a pretty gentle soul. That is unless he is hungry. He was loving baby food, but I made the mistake of giving him some real tasty big people food about two months ago and he has not gone back since. Thanks goodness his two bottom teeth popped out about the same time to aid his mastication.  
• He first really crawled at about 8 months.  He spied the vacuum with its long glorious cord in the living room and had to get there.
• His love of food is just as strong as his love of cords and anything electrical. Bug just discovered electrical outlets a few months ago. We had a brief conversation about them and she hasn't cared about them since. On the other hand, Tank crawled past one, stopped for a double take, and admired this interesting contraption for a while all before attempting to insert his fingers. Since then he searched out and discovered most walls around here have these amazing finger holders. (Sadly he recently found that all outlets are now Tank-proof)
• His latest feat is pulling himself up to stand and subsequently hitting his head on the way down. However, it took him quite awhile to learn how to sit back down. Thank heavens, because we had a couple weeks where he would pull himself up into standing position at night and cry until we laid him back down. We started practicing sitting down in the daytime. 
• Andrew thinks he says "ma ma" but I am more convinced it is "num num" (our word for food).
• And our favorite thing is no one can make our Tank smile as big or laugh as hard as big sister can. We had no idea how much joy it would be watching our kids become little friends.

And so I can look back and have a nostalgic moment, here is Tank crawling.

Wonders

Insanity

This is Tanks area after one meal. Ever since he has been able to grab food this has been the constant state of our kitchen floor. I was having to pull out the broom 3 times a day. I tried ignoring it, but our "dining room"  (if you can call it that) is pretty much in the center of traffic and I was finding cheerios everywhere. Either finding  smashed cheerios in my bed or pulling out the broom 3 times a day was starting to drive me crazy. So, we finally got a battery operated stick vacuum. Andrew got me one for mother's day last year, but I couldn't justify the cost for a once a week sweep. Now, it is a different story. Saying I love this thing is an understatement. I never thought there would come a day that a vacuum could bring me such joy. Not that I doubted, but I guess I really am a mom.

Art board

I really love Sugarboo art. They take old recycled wood and hand paint art prints and picture frames. I do not however, appreciate their prices. While looking at their website a while back, I noticed a poem they had written on some recycled wood that I really loved. I decided that moment I would just have to copy their idea. So here it is. I like the reminder it is to be grateful for the present. And yes, the letters are sruppose to be crooked and wrap around the board. This is about as artistic as I get.

Blessing

I just returned home from another three week stay at my parents house. My father is doing really well. He just finished round 6 of 8 and has been in remission since round 2. The doctor told him he was making history. No one has lived longer than 6 months with this type of double dip lymphoma. I am grateful for the dedication of all those nurses who are there 24 hours a day. They make comments and become misty eyed about how his room feels different than the others. I know that's because a wonderful work is being done in that precious hospital room. The moment I would walk into that room I would feel an instant calm and peaceful feeling. I love the work of the spirit there. The hope is that the cancer will not make an immediate return, but I know his life is already a miracle and am grateful for however much more time God is going to give him.

Andrew came down for the first week and we figured if we wanted to have Tank's baby blessing while he was still a baby, that perhaps we should have it in California. It was originally scheduled for last August, but that was when all my father's health woes started. So, between my father being unable to travel and Andrew's dad's work schedule we thought we might be able to squeeze it in. I am so glad we did. We held it at my parents house and it was wonderful to have family come and show their support and love.

Tank was lucky to have his Grandma Kristin sew his blessing romper and his Grandma Laura crochet his blessing blankie.