Happy Birthday my love, my hubby and Dad extraordinaire!

Happy Birthday Smoochie, aka Daddy. I (we) love you more than words. I'm pretty sure you know this as you get a daily reminder of this when you walk in the door from work. These kids (and myself) are just so happy when you come home. Actually, when you're not here, there is always something missing. We just aren't complete without you. So, today I am extra thankful for you and I can't help but think back of our time together and just how we got to where we are today. What better way than to take a little photo journey back in time. I usually like to do these in chronological order but, today I want to look back from today to the beginning. These are just a few of the moments that make up our lives. I could have put so many more but I think these definitely convey the essence of us... more YOU. We love you and wish you the Happiest Birthday possible!

Go UW!

You've got to love a man that isn't afraid to wear his daughters hair clip.

Proud Daddy of two!

Meeting his daughter for the first time.

We waited so long and shed so many tears for this baby.

Was she ever worth the wait!

The last picture with Mikey before he had to go home to bed.

Naomi came too late in the night for big brother to wait up.

Yeah! I can ride a bike!

Daddy teaching Mikey how to ride a bike

My hubby loves me... he wanted to put the biggest American flag up in the

neighborhood to show me how much he loves me. I love you too.

Waiting for our daughter.

I just love a man that's not afraid to get dirty.

Lucky for me, neither of them are.

I do believe this was a first for all of us... meeting Pooh!

Finally, taking our son home from the hospital, just 17 days in the NICU!

Father and son.

Always my light. He tried to lighten my spirits in the scariest of days, my water broke 8 wks early and it could have been one of the worst moments of my life. Thanks for not letting it (me) get there. You really are my rock, or I like to think my soft spot... I know if I fall I'll always have a safe place to land if you're near.

Christmas 2006... our last one just the two of us.

Baby Mikey...

Good times, good friends.

The early days

My man.

I love you. We love you! Happy Birthday Smoochie!!!

Visitors!

We have been so lucky around here. We had Babcia and Dzia-Dzia surprise us with an unexpected weekend visit. The kids (and us) really enjoyed getting to see them. Daddy has been working like crazy and it was nice to have a little extra help with the kids. The Grandparents always come armed with gifts (which we keep trying to tell ALL of them it's NOT necessary) which the kids enjoyed. Mikey really enjoys maps and asking where he lives, where Grandpa Mike lives, where Babcia lives, where Grandma Robin lives... well, you get the point. It's beyond amazing watching these kids grow up and their curiosity grow with them. So, this globe was a perfect choice for Mikey.

Peek-a-boo! (still a favorite game with Naomi)

Mikey also enjoyed playing doctor with Babcia and Dzia-Dzia...

who knows maybe he'll follow in Daddy's footsteps.

Cheese!

Grandma Robin came and spent a few days with us as well before she went off to her next job. Mikey enjoyed playing games with her and I enjoyed being able to go for my morning runs knowing the kids were in good hands.

This is a favorite game around here now, another favorite is Jenga and I must say Mikey is really good! The kid has some crazy steady hands.

After the Grandparents left we had our good friends from Madison with their two boys here for 3 days. It was really nice and I can honestly say that even at such a young age these kids are showing signs that they'll be friends for life. I suck though as I didn't get any pictures from their visit. My camera was dead and instead of charging the battery (which I still need to do) I just keep thinking about it. Yeah, I know. I'm going to get on that.

Anyhow, I'm really glad we had company when we did. Naomi came down with a 48 hr fever which made her so lethargic and sad. Just when she was getting better poor Mikey got it. He is starting to look better but still a low grade fever hanging around today. As if that wasn't enough, I woke up with pink eye again yesterday. What the heck!

The joys of being a Mom I guess. ; )

Fun in the sun!

I'm a bit disappointed in myself. We spent 2 weeks in Florida and I have very few photos to show for our time there. Apparently I wasn't thinking. Note to self: don't ever do that again. The only redeeming part is the few pictures I did get are cute and capture the mood of the trip. Naomi went to the beach for the first time and her main objective (at 8 mos of age) was to eat sand! I expected this. Mikey had a blast spending his time playing in the sand, building sandcastles. Lucky for me Aunt Yvonne was there to help him (and me) as we had to keep Naomi out of the sand to keep minimal amounts of sand from entering her mouth. Thus requiring two adults. All in all we had a great trip, spent some quality time with the Grandparents and came back a few shade darker. Great success!

Changing times

Let's just say that the baby proofing has begun got me freaking out. I left for vacation to Florida with a baby who was rolling but not very mobile by any means. I brought back a baby who is mobile! Let me tell you this girl is checking everything out. Which is good, no fantastic… just scary. I’m so nervous she’s going to hurt herself. We’ve put up a gate blocking the stairs to the basement and did all your standard baby proofing. However, the questions remains… is it enough? I’m adding to my daily prayers.

This video was taken at Grandpa’s house… of course Naomi crawled for the first time after Daddy had to leave to get back to work. Thank heavens for videos.

Busy as a bee

I wanted to send out a picture of Naomi in her thank you notes for her baptism so I decided to try and take the photo myself. We had so much fun. I loved getting her to smile for me and she had the best time trying to eat her gown! That was all she was interested in... little stinker. Anyhow, the above picture is the one I sent to everyone.

I think for an amateur I did pretty good.

Besides, when your subject is this cute how can you really go wrong?

Let me tell you, you can't. I loved every single picture I got.

Even got this handsome little guy to sit for me. Lately, he refuses to let me take his picture. That's fine, it just means pretty much any photo we get is very candid.

Brotherly love

These two melt my heart.

Now: of to pack for Florida! Woo-hoo!!!!

Exploring

Now that Naomi is on the move, she loves to get to this air vent. Her hair blows wildly and she giggles... it's really something to watch her explore with her new found freedom.

Hmmm, how does that happen?

Big brother is always right there to make sure she's not hurting herself. Mikey will call for me and ask if what she's doing is OK. Then once I say sure, she's fine he's right in there with her exploring. They are really funny.

Just to clarify~ Naomi is rolling and scooting, no crawling yet. She gets up on all four and rocks. I know it's right around the corner. She's plenty fast as she is right now though. Naomi has 3 teeth.. working on 4 and it seems as if nothing will slow her down.

Mikey is getting big and talking all the time. He loves school, so much so that I'm really sad for him that the school year is coming to an end. He's going to be so upset. I'm sure that our trip to Florida will help ease and post-school blues. We can't wait... just a few more weeks and we'll be at the beach and pool every day!!!

Fun in MN!

We went to Mall of America this weekend, and as always it was fun!

I love this picture of them... what a riot!!!

Daddy got to relax with Naomi while she napped.

Mikey and I took this on our way to the Ferris wheel.

Lucky me... I'm such a nervous wreak that anytime the

poor kid even moved I kept reminding him to sit still.

I'm sitting still Mom...

What if I move just a little?

Ok, ok...

I guess I'll just nap if I can't move.

We took Mikey and Naomi on Naomi's first train ride

She seemed to get a kick out of it.

Actually she just likes doing anything big brother does.

It's really sweet.

A little downtime at home

Parallel play anyone?

Happy kids = Happy Mom!