Various happenings from the past couple weeks

Erik combed his hair himself and made it “spiky”as he said.

Erik and Daddy went to the Zoo again to feed the giraffes. Last time we went Erik really wanted to feed the giraffes, but we were there at the wrong time of day. So they went again, and had some good time with just the two of them.

The green stripes in Tyler’s shirt matched Daddy’s shirt – so I had to take a picture :)

Tyler in the bath – he doesn't mind having a bath too much – but he hates it after he gets out when I am trying to dry and dress him. I guess he gets cold and then he gets mad. It does give me a reason to actually put him in a long sleeved sleeper though – which is fun since he is practically always in a onesie as it is still always hot here.

Tyler doing…well… pretty much nothing. This doesn’t have to do with this picture, but he has been smiling and cooing a lot the past week and a half. He’s definitely getting more social and interactive!

Also, as of this past Wednesday Sept. 23rd Tyler is 12 lbs 6 oz, 23.2 inches long and 15.4 inches around his head. Not surprising as he was 9lbs at birth, but still my baby's 12 lbs already at 6 1/2 weeks old (7 weeks now)!

I wanted to get a picture of the back of Tyler’s head so I can remember how it looks now, before he rubs all the hair off the back and gets the typical baby bald spot.

He was cute in this Winnie the Pooh outfit. It made me think of when Erik was a baby…I guess I have specific memories of Erik wearing it, and Adam hardly wore it as it was the dead middle of summer when he was this age. Tyler looked a lot like Erik to me that evening – especially from the back – where he has more hair like Erik did :)

Erik on the Table

Wow, I love our new table!

Of course it is a lot easier to appreciate it now that it is finished and Alex is not spending all his free time working on it while I am grouchily in the house with the three kids. And yes Alex did hoodwink me into letting him get lots of crazy tools with promises of future furniture…not that I could really  have stopped him if I’d tried. He is so good at making his point of view sound so totally logical (even when it’s not). But maybe it will turn out to be logical after all…in the long run! We do have a beautiful table now!! And in a year or so we are going to want bunk beds, but we can’t buy them as they need to be shorter than standard ones due to the ceiling fan …so I am exited that Alex can make them however we want!

Our new kitchen table

This is Alex writing. Yes, I’m hijacking the blog again. It’s fun to do. Anyways, I just finished building a kitchen table for Dawn. I wanted to build it for her anyways, but I used it to convince her that buying my expensive tools would be worth it. Purchasing this table would be around 2500 dollars.

So 3 years ago I promised her a table. About a year after that I bought the table legs and the wood for the table. The wood sat in my garage for nearly 2 years while I ignored it. Finally, this last May, I decided to fulfill my promise and give her the table she deserves.

Once I set about bringing everything together I discovered that I didn’t have enough wood to get the width of table I needed, nor could I find wood of the same color (That’s really important in furniture.) So, I bought all new boards for the top which was a bit expensive considering I had already bought the boards for it.

So, I then went about assembling the pieces for the base. It didn’t take very long to do. I put the finish on the boards before I glued them together which saved a lot of work and headaches. It turned out beautiful too. Very smooth. Four coats of water based polycrylic finish. The finish doesn’t have a nasty odor either so I was able to do it inside without expelling anyone from the house.

I finished the base and glued up the first try of the top just before all the relatives arrived for Tyler’s baby blessing. Unfortunately the top had a nasty cup in it, so my friend Cy helped me to cut it back up, prepare the sides to be glued, and helped me glue it in about 4 hours.

After regluing it I tapered the underside to 1/2” thick at the edge and put a subtle curve on each side. I finished the top with 5 coats of polycrylic which took the better part of 2 days. I buffed the last coat with 0000 steel wool.

I’m really glad I finished. There aren’t many things that can compare with the feeling of finishing a project of this length or magnitude.

Now on to other projects before I get stir crazy.

Our little Ballerina

Adam often stands on his tippy-toes and dances around while watching TV.

Sometimes he just stands there and tiptoes around a little…usually going backwards…

But sometimes he gets quite exuberant and dances all around. Especially when the teamwork song on Wonder Pets comes on. He jumps up, yells team-work, and points one arm up in the air! (All while on his toes of course :)

Here is a sequence of pictures so you can experience the flow of his “dance”…hehe :p

Adam was doing this while we had family over last week. A discussion ensued as to what a male ballet dancer is called. We found two possibilities… danseur (French) or ballerino (Italian) - according to wikipedia – I know, highly renowned sources we have here.

So here’s to our little ballerino!

P.S. My Dad walks around on his tiptoes a lot - so maybe it is genetic...

and thanks to Grandpa John who took these pictures, for capturing this funny occurrence for us!

Tyler’s blessing

We had lots of family come visit us this weekend for Tyler’s blessing at church. We have been having a great time with them and enjoying a lot of wonderful food that Alex made for everyone!

Today we went to the Zoo with Alex’s parents and Uncle Peter and Aunt Kendall. My family had to fly home to CA this morning…We miss you guys already…hope you had a good trip home :)

Here’s Erik on Grandpa John’s shoulders and Adam on Daddy’s.

Adam on a big rock.

Erik in a big turtle shell.

Erik inside the big turtle shell.

Grandma Linda with Tyler.

And there’s Tyler again :)

Uncle Peter and Aunt Kendall

Tyler again!

I took these pictures a little over a week ago (Aug 28th), when Tyler was almost 3 weeks old. How cute!

This picture makes me laugh. Look at those cheeks!

I love baby feet :)