Lake Anna

We went to Lake Anna yesterday with a group of 14 friends and we had a blast!! We had a pontoon boat and one couple owns a ski boat. We anchored up right on a small beach, grilled out, swam, and even went tubing and skiing. It was so fun!! Alex LOVED swimming out from the beach and kept going under water intentionally, trying to swim. He was not afraid at all and was having a total blast. He had NO nap all day and when we left at 5pm he was absolutely done. He's still recovering right now...he's been napping for 3 hours right now and hasn't stirred yet!

He like his big boy life jacket!

Fun times with daddy out in the deeper water!

"Hi mommy," he kept yelling from out behind the boat! Heart melting...

Dads and kids everywhere!

The Caola's daughter, Catherine, was there and she and Alex had fun...he is only about a month older than her.

What a ham!

Little cuties!

full tummy after lunch

fruit snack break...

yummmmmmmy

Alex LOVES the foam noodles...he kept insisting on holding it and he was rolling off of it like you would trying to stand on a log while it was rolling

wweeeeeeeee

Soooooo fun!

Chowing down, entire arm in the bag...on the way back to the boat dock.

Can't get enough BBQ chips....

yum yum yum

THE BIG POOP

For my 100th BLOG, I'm bragging about my son's poop. Right before his bath tonight, Alex told me, "poop...potty." I asked him, "Do you want to go sit on the potty?" He said, "Yes." I was reading him a book while he sat on the potty and he just pooped (and then went pee pee too). He said, "all done" and stood up. He looked into his potty, pointed at his poop, and said, "poop...my poop....I pooped." I called Marc upstairs and we clapped and cheered! Alex had a huge grin in his face. I cleaned up his bottom and ran his bath water. After his bath he wanted to check out the poop again, before I cleaned it up. Before bedtime we asked him numerous times, "Did you poop in the potty like a big boy?" "Yes," he kept telling us. Well, hopefully it was not a one-time occurence, although we are letting him do this at his own pace. We have not been pressing it at all and he usually says "no" when we ask him if he wants to sit on the potty (after the initial excitement wore off when we got it). Well, we are very proud of him and we'll keep updates coming!

99 Red Balloons

Okay, I titled this BLOG "99 Red Balloons" because its my 99th BLOG since I started it in October 2007...that's 99 BLOGS in only 22 months! Good average for me, I'd say. Here are some pics of Alex from last weekend. We watched our neighbor's grandson all day so he and Alex whooped it up. We went to gymnastics and they played in the splash pool in the backyard. They were exhausted at the end of the day but still managed to have fun in a bubble bath!!

"new" PJs from consignment...soooo cute.

Here is Alex trying to ride Duke before Marc could put him together. As you can see the base is not attached yet...Duke is just sitting on the ground.

Alex liked the foam peanuts almost as much as Duke. Thanks for that, dad...I'll make it up to you somehow. We HAD to dump the whole box out b/c one of the four springs was loose in the box and we couldn't find it otherwise. Sigh...

prepping for a Tarzan swing...

serious concentration on the balance beam...

the trampoline is always a favorite...

Alex and John Michael...they are such good friends

water time!

scrub a dub dub

bubble man

more tub fun

New Videos!!

There is some serious concentration going on here as Alex tries to put on Marc's tennis shoes and then walk/run in them...

Water play on Saturday, 1 August.

Here is Alex's first bubble bath on Wednesday, 29 July. He LOVES bubble baths now and asks for "bubbles, bubbles" every night now.

We are now the proud owners of Duke, Charlie's 25-year old horse. It has been through many generations of the Stocker and Hodge families and now Alex gets a turn. We figure we'll pass the reins (literally) to Callie if we're lucky enough to get orders to Camp Pendleton next summer! I have another good video that I'll put up later in which Alex makes "Yee-Haw" sound like "Hee-haw."

Bell Butt

Bell butt is what Alex calls his belly button and during water play a few weeks ago he stopped in the middle of everything and all the excitement to show it to me. It's hard to believe July is over...Marc and I have been in school for a week and Alex is enjoying his new daycare. I'll post some videos tomorrow...good one of Alex's first bubble bath. Now he asks for bubbles every night...he loves playing with them in the tub!

Bell butt, ma ma!

ALLLL the toys have to go into the pool!

What'd I do?

Alex has LOVED playing with Charlie's old animals since we went to the zoo. He likes to line them all up, side-by-side (I swear I didn't start that) and a head-to-tail line for a parade.

Coloring a picture with markers (the neat Crayola ones that only write on the special paper!) with daddy.

I bought Alex some items off of Craig's List for his Birthday (can't tell you what they are yet!!!) and while I was picking them up the nice lady gave me like three other toys for free! One of them was this Dirt Devil cleaning set which is PERFECT for Alex. He's obsessed with cleaning too (fake cleaning, no cleaning up his toys and messes) and the set has a bucket, dustpan w/ foxtail (in his right hand), two sponges, a pretend squirt-bottle (he loves to 'spray' mommy), two dust mits (like mittens), a broom (in his left hand) and a small spot brush (also in his left hand).

Here he is with the broom (misc vacuum piece on the end of the broom b/c I didn't know what else to do with it) and fake squirt bottle. He had just woken up from a nap in this picture and I had just given him the toys so he was in the "awe" phase.

hangin' out with daddy in the front yard...picture taken by Marc

munchin' on chips at the breakfast bar

playing with his balloon in his new baseball pajamas

new PJs and daddy's "ankle" socks that go to his knees..he does this ALL the time now and it's so funny

another great shot of the ankle-knee socks...they look like little boots

new pajamas from Aunt Tracey...they finally fit him and he said "wow" when I held them up

grumpy face but cute pajamas!!

yummy dinner at his big boy table

new sunglasses..."the aviator"

first ice cream cone...he didn't eat it. i did.

CAN'T WAIT TO MEET LIL' MJ!

The whole reason of my mom coming to visit two weekends ago was because we hosted a baby shower for Megan in Annapolis. Little MJ (Michael John IV) is due in about 2 weeks from now and we wanted to do something extra special for Megan. For those that don't know Megan was my college roommate and is (still) my best friend. She's the best friend any girl could hope for and is going to be an AMAZING mom. She's so loving and always puts others first. MJ is one lucky little guy. She has done up his room with a Dr. Seuss theme and it's soooo cute. She got lots of cute Dr. Seuss stuff to add to the room! Meg, we love you and can't wait to meet MJ!!!!! Meg and her mom, Barbara, the grandmother-to-be...

Me and Meg...for some reason out of the 80 pictures my mom and I took none have her in them. We did equally co-host the shower, we were just too busy documenting it I guess!!

Below...Megan's guests arrive...

We had lots of yummies to snack on...

...including double fudge cake that matched the invitations!!

We did not eat the diaper cake...my mom and I used 201 diapers and did a Dr. Seuss theme for it.

Katie and I enjoying our food.

We did exercise the guests' minds with three games. Katie won the don't-say-"baby"-game and got a yummy candle...no picture, darn it!!!

Megan won the celebrity baby name game...way to go Put!

Monika won the memory game...list what you remember from the diaper cake after observing it. Okay, okay, Barbara won but forfeited her prize to the second place finisher so they both got in the picture! :)

Below...Meg opens her gifts!!

cute clothes for her little monkey

cat-in-the-hat dipaer stacker!!!

growth chart, thermometer, hangars

adorable furry friends

jammies and his own Bill the goat...Go Navy!!

We had lots of good, funny mommy sharing time for stories and advice! Like the cake said, "Tiny Hands and Little Feet, Hello MJ and Goodbye Sleep!"