At last-photos of Lucy!!

As having a new baby sister is certainly an adventure for Spencer, we will be keeping the same blog. At long last, here are some pictures of a very new baby Lucy. She is an amazing baby and we are all happy and healthy! ;)

Spencer's 2nd birthday!

Spencer turned 2!!! How is that possible? ;) Time flies so fast when you are having fun!

For Spencer's second birthday, we had a small party with friends big and small. I am fairly certain that Spencer's favorite part was the HUGE piece of cake that he devoured with both hands - very nice and messy! Did you notice the beautiful cake I decorated? Yea right!! Martha Stuart I am not...thank goodness for local bakeries! All in all, I think a good time was had by young and older.

Holiday Season!

Some fun photos of Spencer enjoying his second holiday season! Cutting down the Christmas tree with friends Joel and Willa, decorating the tree, hanging lights with Dad and decorating Christmas cookies!!

Whirlwind Grandparent tour

Over the past three weekends, Spencer has visited Nana Roxanne, Papa Lobe, Grandpa Michael, Grandpa Bob, Grandma Sandi, Meemaw Becky and Pawpaw Hoop! What a whirlwind!! This started with a weekend in Boise so that Brad and I could go to the baby shower of some great friends (Shane and Tanya). Nana Roxanne and Papa Lobe had lots of babysitting time that weekend, which was fantastic for Brad and I.

The following weekend, my Dad (Grandpa Michael) came for a wonderful weekend visit. Spencer LOVED watching Grandpa play guitar.

Lastly, we spent the week of Thanksgiving in Indiana. We had a great visit with lots of family. We spent Thanksgiving with Grandpa Bob and Grandma Sandi and followed it up with a visit to Meemaw and Papaw's house. The highlight for Spencer was visiting with his cousin Cristina. Wow, is he enamoured with her!! They spent lots of time reading books, chasing each other through the house and just laughing. Very fun to watch!

Spencer was an absolute champ on both plane rides (thank goodness).

Fall is here!

And, so is the rain...so, here I am posting again! After a full summer of playing outside, I am starting to wonder what to do with little man on these rainy days. The answer, buy rain boots for Spencer and Mom and head out! Spencer is becoming an excellent puddle stomper and Mom was glad to see they make such cute rain boots for adults! Here are some fun fall pictures...

We are going to have to change the name of the Blog!

Although, this will be quite the adventure for Spencer...and for us! Here is the first picture of baby Vasel number 2! Surprise!! ;) Due May 15th...

Happy Halloween!!

We had a fantastic Halloween trick-or-treating with neighbors! We had a garden gnome (Willa), a peacock (Stella), monkey (Finn) a bumble-bee (Joel) and Spencer as Frankenstein! With lots of help from my crafty friend Sara, I was able to make Spencer's Halloween costume this year. Lots of fun! Although, a few neighbors asked what he was...oh well, I never claimed to be Martha Stewart! ;)

We finished the evening by putting all the kids down at Grant and Sue's house and having Thai food and lots of fun Halloween drinks...

Enjoy the pictures!!

SUMMER!!!

Wow - has anyone wondered where I have been?? ;) Some of you parents may have noticed the corelation between Spencer walking, summer arriving and the lack of posts to this blog!! Whew - we have been busy! I want to catch everyone up, but for now, enjoy a super sweet picture of Spencer! ;)

First haircut

OK - seriously time for a haircut! Spencer has "wings" straight out of the 80's! Take a look at the before and after pictures...

Walking!

Just two weeks ago, Spencer took a couple of tentative steps...now he is cruising!! I swear he has gone straight from walking to running. He keeps his arms up in the air for balance - so cute.. His Meemaw is here and took this video...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYV988bXRyM

Evening entertainment

New entertainment on the block. Spencer had a blast pushing Willa on her new train...maybe they have a future in rally car?

Reading fun...

One of the many visions I had while pregnant was of me and my baby spending hours together snuggled under a blanket reading. I pictured him patiently turning the pages, enraptured by every word. Hmmm, another pregnancy vision that did not come to reality (along with making all of his food from scratch and feeding him only organic...yea right...who has the time?). Instead, my little guy decided early on that the best part of the book was the last page and he would turn the pages as fast as he could until he got there! Meanwhile, I am reading every other page of "Guess how much I love you" at mock 10 speed to try and keep up. This assumes he would actually sit in my lap for the entire book...which was rarely the case! ;) All of this changed this week. I don't know if it is temporary, but Spencer is suddenly totally into his books! If there is a pile nearby, he will hold up one after the other (saying "ga"..his version of "I want that") until I have finished the pile. At that point, the game starts over. I am so excited about his new interest that I don't mind reading "Hop on Pop" (for the 10th time in a row). Ask me next week!

So much fun... ;)

Nap time....

I found Jackson in with Spencer during nap time this morning....

Pictures from our weekend at Tamarack

We spent a weekend at Tamarack to enjoy Patrick and Angie's wedding...and, the wonderful skiing!!

January Adventures

January brought an unexpected trip to Seattle. Brad had a business trip to Japan which meant a drive up to Seattle to quickly get his passport renewed (oops!). Anyhow, we decided to make a day of it (we called it our "chowder run"). In the past, if we timed a nice long car trip around nap time we were guaranteed a nap from Spencer. Now that we have turned his car seat around, this is no longer the case! There are way too many fun things to look at out the window! So, unfortunately, Spencer decided not to nap on the two hour drive... Oh well, he was still a trooper and we had a great day. We walked through Pike market and managed to find the best chowder...mission accomplished!! (Oh yea, and we got Brad's passport renewed).

Spencer's next big adventure was snowshoeing. Nothing crazy, just a quick little walk in the snow..in the sun! We had not seen the sun in a while (all that stuff they say about it raining in Portland is totally accurate) and were happy to get out to soak up a little vitamin D! We drove towards Mount Hood around 45 minutes from Portland and hiked around in the snow.

New "sleeping" habits

So, Spencer has decided that it is more fun to sit up in his crib and play than it is to sleep. We are not sure why it took him so long to put this together..but, we are happy it did! As of this weekend, when we lay him down he immediately gets up to play! On Saturday I heard him giggling in the bedroom and walked in to find him in his crib surrounded by kleenex. Silly monkey boy reached through the crib slats and quickly emtied the contents of a huge box of kleenex. It took restraint to keep from cracking up! (I did after I put him back down and left the room). Too funny!

The first birthday video!!

Meemaw captured this video of Spencer and his cake!!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_OfOmMU_dks

"Rock"abye baby

Spencer has officially experienced his first rock concert! Kind of...Brad and I took him to see the "Toy Trains" a local band that caters to the under 5 set. The Toy Trains were playing at a great local restaurant on Saturday night from 6:00 to 7:30 so we decided to check it out. Brad assumed it would be four guys in cardigans and potentially a ukulele or banjo. He could not have been more wrong! These guys were great...playing lots of fun original music as well as rockin renditions of "twinkle twinkle" and other kids favorites. The place was packed with little ones dancing everywhere! Spencer was head bobbing and watching all of the excitement with a huge smile on his face. The music was so good that if you closed your eyes, and took a sip of your beer, you almost felt like you were out on a Saturday night and it was past 10 (instead of 6:15)! ;) We had a great time and will probably become "Toy Train" groupies!! ;)

Crawling!

This video was taken within minutes of Spencer figuring out how to crawl...now we can't stop him!

Spencer "reading"!

Christmas!!!

The holidays are here!!! Brad and I enjoyed our first holiday season with our little man. We tried to enjoy lots of fun Portland holiday activities. We started the season with a progressive dinner with five other neighborhood households. After putting all of the kids down at the designated babysitter house, we wandered from house to house for each new course. What a great way to spend time with good friends! Brad and I were in charge of dessert and I had a great time baking!

The holiday season continued with a trip to Chicago to celebrate an early Christmas with Becky, Hoop, Bob, Marta and Cristina. Spencer had his first taste of wrapping paper and presents (and I am pretty sure he liked the paper the best!). Spencer also had a great time playing with his cousin Cristina. Cristina tried, unsuccessfully, to teach him to walk! ;) She also taught him how to tear into his Christmas presents!

We headed to Boise for the actual Christmas holiday and Spencer had a great time with his cousins Jack and Holden! Grandma Roxanne watched Spencer for a day while Brad and I enjoyed skiing with our great friends Shane, Tanya, Brad and Sarah - it felt like the good old days!! So nice to see everyone... Spencer was a sport as we dragged him around the country for his first holiday. I have always felt that the holiday time of year was magical, and think it is even more magical to see through your young child's eyes...

Thanksgiving!

Wow - so much to give thanks for this year. Brad and I are such happy new parents and are excited for all of the adventures and challenges to come! We spent a wonderful and quiet Thanksgiving with Mom and Lobert...great food, great wine...doesn't get much better! Spencer joined us at the Thanksgiving table and had his first taste of all the goodies....

Love this picture of Spencer on his first swing...

More firsts - first Halloween!

Ok - so this was SO much more fun for Brad and I than Spencer. But, he puts up with it! It didn't help that I bought the costume three weeks early and it was already a little tight by the time he wore it for Halloween... ;) We went trick-or-treating with two other friends from the neighborhood - Willa (aka Yoda) and Joel the little ghost. I think everyone was tired by the end of the night....

First Pumpkin Patch!

What a wonderful way to spend a beautiful fall day in Portland - going to the pumpkin patch! We even found an area filled with pumpkins that were just Spencer's size...too fun. He was having so much fun looking at the pumpkins that all of our pictures are of him looking down. Oh well, he was having a great time!!

News that I forgot to write last time - I have started a new job! I am working for Nike (which many people don't know is headquartered in Portland) and so far it has been great. I am in a finance role on a part-time basis which is just perfect. I am currently working 3 days a week and am home and playing with my little man by 4:00 each day. I also have two full days with him which we have filled with music classes, coffee with friends and lots of playing...

Time Flies...

Wow - I haven't written since September 23rd! My how time flies...is anyone still reading this blog? ;) Thing have been great in Portland, OR. We finished up the summer with lots of fun hikes and weekend trips to the coast. We spent a lovely time with Stacy, Jake, Tristan and Grace on Cannon Beach in early October and were back again for a fun yurting weekend with the family a few weekends later. (Who knew "yurting" was a verb??). I have attached some fun pictures from each weekend. Spencer has been to the coast many times, but was able to introduce it to his cousin Holden for his first time!