Yellow Cake & Chocolate Icing

If you know me and John, you know that dessert doesn’t get much better than boxed yellow cake and chocolate icing in a can.  I guess I’ll take getting another year older so I can partake in this delicacy.  John made a fabulous cake for me but we’ll definitely need to seriously consider any plans of expanding our family because now we have to split the cake four ways. Add another little Ward and we’ll need to make two cakes.  One for Mommy, one for the boys to fight over.
What? You think I’m kidding? Not a chance.

To My Grandpa

 

A giant pine, magnificent and old
Stood staunch against the sky and all around
Shed beauty, grace and power.
Within its fold birds safely reared their young.
The velvet ground beneath was gentle,
and the cooling shade gave cheer to passers by.
Its towering arms a landmark stood, erect and unafraid,
As if to say, “Fear naught from life’s alarms”.

It fell one day.
Where it had dauntless stood was loneliness and void.
But men who passed paid tribute – and said,
“To know this life was good,
It left it’s mark on me. Its work stands fast”.
And so it lives. Such life no bonds can hold -
This giant pine, magnificent and old.

by Georgia Harkness

Stop Clowning Around

For John’s birthday in 2009 (a few months before Sean was born) Leigh gave him a picture of a clown he drew in elementary school.  When my mom shipped my storage unit of things (yes I said storage unit... that’s a story for another time people) down last year, wouldn’t you know that she also kept a clown picture I painted in 2nd grade.  I just framed both of them and now they’re in the playroom.  How cool, right?! 

Help a Brother Out

It’s been fun to see Sean and Dylan work together more and more every day.  Lately Sean wants to help Dylan wipe his hands (pronounced with an English accent), cheeks, mouth and “nosey-nose-nose” after meals.  It’s pretty cute and by the rate they’re moving, I shouldn’t have to do much more than drive the car by 2015. 

Perrrrrfect. 

It’s all happening according to plan. 

We’re so excited Sean can use a camera

Now he can capture shots like this:

… and this:

Yes that’s how we entertained our sons last night while they were eating dinner (man we’re gonna be some embarrassing parents when they are teenagers).  We were going for the Spartan Cheerleader pose.  How do you think we did?

The Dancing Bug

Dylan seems to have a bad case of The Dancing Bug.  He love music and dancing just like his momma.  Someone who will do jazz hands and a few twists and turns with me at the most random times? Yes, please!

30 Years Later…

…and still lookin’ good, Dad! Funny how, minus the lamb chops, he looks almost the same.  Even the type of outfit with a brown coat and jeans!  I suspect I was around Sean’s age (3 or 4) in the picture below.  How time sure does fly.

Christmas 2012

I know I say it every year, but wow – can you believe it’s already come and gone?  It started with an awesome visit from Santa (you can see Sean’s note he asked me to write below) followed by a drive to Richmond for a Ward Family Christmas Party and then on to Annapolis for a few days with the McDaris/Wiberg clans.  The boys got some awesome gifts including a big boy bike with training wheels for Sean, scooters, helicopters, bath music toys, pirate ships, construction sites… !  Polly came with us and only pooped inside once (that I’ll admit we know of) so I consider that a success.  We had our first annual Swedish Christmas Eve dinner which was really fun – herring, Swedish meatballs, potatoes, lingonberries and of course Glogg.  Thank you to the Wibergs for introducing us to your traditions :)  We went up to PA for the day to see Granny and Grandpa and got to see their new house which is beautiful.  We made a few trips down to Annapolis – John got his oyster shooters – and even walked home one night!  Doctor Noelle came by for dinner one night and then it was finally time to pack up the car and head home.  Thank goodness for DVD players in the car ;) John and I can now recite Finding Nemo and Madagascar 2 better than we’d like to admit.

Waiting patiently for Santa

Dad is uh-mazing!

Singing and Dancing to Christmas 2012

The boys are really getting in the Christmas spirit!

Singing and Dancing - Xmas 2012 from Corinne on Vimeo.

A Visit to Santa

I can’t believe I’m going to write this, but we actually went to visit Santa this weekend (our fourth year in a row with the Chin family) and for the first time ever, it went beautifully!  We got there on time, the line wasn’t bad at all, Sean told Santa exactly what he wanted (even spoke on behalf of his brother), they sat with Santa, got their picture taken and we were done.  No crying, no screaming, no people in line yelling at each other.  Whoohoo!  It went a little something like this…

Santa: “What would you like for Christmas this year?”

Sean: “A rocket ship and a rocket ship airplane and my brother wants his own chair”

Santa: <confused>  “What does your brother want?”

Sean: “His own chair because he always sits in mine!”

Thanksgiving 2012

After 3 years we finally made it back to the Outer Banks for Thanksgiving, but this time we came as a family of 4! We had such a good time catching up with everyone and were so lucky to have an awesome cottage (thank you Mike and Gale) for the week.  Sean and Dylan just loved hanging out with their aunts, uncles, grandparents and great-grandparents.  We did a little bit of everything and were sad to leave – it’s always so fast.  Here’s our week in pictures…

Scootin’

I’ll never forget coming home from a work trip on June 1st 2012. As soon as I walked in the door John said “Check this out – look what Dylan’s doing!”  Sure enough, Dylan decided his first mode of transportation would be scooting instead of crawling. At first we thought it was so cute and laughed at how funny he looked.  But let me tell you, by September we didn’t think it was so cute.  I was bargain hunting at the stores buying endless supplies of shorts and pants because every time I turned around he had ripped holes in another pair. And not holes as in ‘oh I’ll just patch that up’ – I mean his diaper was hanging out and he was definitely feeling a nice breeze kind of holes.  It seemed like the poor child would never walk.  But Dylan got really bad double ear infections and pneumonia in October and would you believe that a double dose of steroids was what it took to make that kid walk?!  I brought him home from urgent care on Sunday afternoon and instead of going to sleep like I thought he would (the poor baby was so sick) he proceeded to start singing and walking all over the house.  And as they say, the rest is history!

I made this video to show how good Dylan at scooting – no wonder he wasn’t interested in walking! The first clip is from that night back in June when he just started.  By the end he was going as fast as he would if he were to walk, and was even able to “jump” when you asked him! haha

Happy Halloween 2012!

Well Sean sure got some good use out of his Knight costume this year (Dylan had to miss a lot of the fun this year because he was sick… but he was always there in spirit).  We went to a few parties over the past 2 weeks and topped it off with some great trick-or-treating last night.  We had double the fun with Jen and Grant (Grant’s daddy was out of town for work) and made it to almost 10 houses!

 

Family, Zoo, Boats – Go!

Better late than never, right?

Here are some collages I put together (how did I forgot to post?) from our trip to MD in August.  We got to visit lots of family, meet new baby Hayden!, go to the National Zoo, and take a beautiful sunset cruise on Pinch Me with Aunt Noelle!!  What a busy but great visit.

I think that officially wraps up my August photos.  Phew. Now on to fall pictures :-|

A Visit to Grandma and Grandpa’s House

One of the trips we made in August was to visit Grandma and Grandpa up in Pennsylvania.  I don’t know how to explain it but their house has always held a special magic and I think that’s especially true for me and my cousins Phil and Paul.  Being a kid there playing in the pond, wrecking driving 4-wheelers, skeet shooting, and family ping pong where you learned how to strut your stuff are the kind of memories that stick with you for a lifetime.  Although as an adult I haven’t been able to spend near as much time there as I would have liked, it was so special for me to bring Sean and Dylan, if only for a day, to hopefully share in that magic and recapture some of those wonderful childhood memories of my own.

Sean’s 3rd Birthday

Our baby turned 3 years old last month – yikes. He had a great birthday at Pop Pop and GG’s house and we were thrilled that so many people were able to come!  We had great food, opened lots of presents and were able to make some time for the boats and wave runners.  Sean didn’t love us singing to him (in fact I think we may have permanently damaged him with the Happy Birthday song) - he was more interested in playing with all of his new toys :)

The “Cool” Family Visits

Earlier last month we had a great visit from Uncle Marshall & Aunt Megan and Cousin Katie and Rob (or as Sean liked to call him, “Bob” (I think Sean will get along splendidly with Mamaw Bryant - haha)).  The boys - John included - were really excited to hang out and everyone kept busy going to the pool, for a ride on the boat and playing guitars.  It’s a heck of a drive from home for all of them and we were so happy that they came and spent some time with us!  I guess this means that it’s our turn to drive up next… :)

Sean’s 1st Day of Preschool

I just got back from dropping Sean off for his 1st day of preschool (he’ll be going T/Th in the afternoons). I was prepared for a lot of tears (from both of us) but as usual Sean made the transition easily and seemed really excited about going to school. He brought his “Lightning McQueen & Mater backpack” with a water bottle and change of clothes. He’s excited because they have a fish tank there and as soon as we walked in he asked Miss Sally their names (Nemo, Goldie & Oreo). I can’t wait to hear all about his new adventures and given the amount he talks these days, he’ll go on and on until it’s time for bed telling us about it!