Some photos of the boys.

What's this, another post by Manda?! I know it's hard to believe.

The boys are staying active. They are getting to spend a lot of time with Tj lately and we are all enjoying it. We all went to the Sugar Mill Garden and had a good day. It would have been better had we had bug spray. There was a cat there and Joel was very interested in it.

Joel and Vance are still the best of friends. Joel constantly makes me laugh. He is very good about sharing and making sure that Vance gets a turn with whatever he's doing. They love to play together and wrestle around. In all honestly it makes me a little nervous but Tj makes sure to referee.

Joel is our little songbird. He LOVES to sing! He loves to sing "Jesus Wants Me For a Sunbeam", "The ABC Song", "I am a Child of God", "Once there was a Snowman" (Yeah talk about ironic. The boy has never seen snow but loves to sing about snowmen.), the "Monkey" songs (monkeys jumping on beds and teasing the alligator), and all the other songs that are played on his and Vance's toys. His vocabulary continues to increase. Our favorite words lately are "Thank You" and "You're Welcome". He thanks us probably 75 times a day. For everything from getting him food to sending him to timeout. He's so funny! Hopefully he'll always be so polite.

Vance is our entertainer. He is always doing things to make us laugh. His latest thing is that he loves to stick out his tongue. He loves to empty my cupboards and "help" me empty the dishwasher. He is still my little mommas boy. Sometimes it's fun but other times it's frustrating. Vance also LOVES to dance. His little boogying cracks me up. But I love that he loves to move and groove. Vance is also trying very dilligently to keep up with Joel's vocabulary. He's always trying to mimic our words including: down, done, up, dada, and ah. He will also sign "More".

Other than that we're just continuing on with life. We're a little sick of all the rain we're getting courtesy of Fay. Although, we do need the rain and we have been blessed with safety. We have also been enjoying the Olympics. Our favorites (swimming and gymnastics) are now over but we're still enjoying watching the volleyball and track events. So that's what's going on here.

Happy Birthday Vance!

So Saturday was Vance's first birthday. What an incredible year this has been. We had a little party for him. He's our little monkey so that was the theme for his party. We had little monkey cupcakes and my friend Lindsey made a banana cake for Vance. We had a little barbecue and the boys played at the playground. Vance got lots of presents from family and friends. And of course he loved being able to dig into his cake. Surprising enough he hated getting cleaned up. It was a fun afternoon. We love our little Vance!

A Family Reunion of Sorts

So my cool cousin Xela (shay-lah) stopped by to see me today. Now that may not mean a lot to most people but she is a world traveler currently residing in AZ. She was out here visiting some friends and stopped by. It was so great to see her! She is such an amazing person. She has lived in SO many places and had so many experiences that I cannot even fathom. Her most recent job was helping at-risk youth in an outward bound type program. She is now getting ready to start her masters program in social work. Her goal- start a home in Guatemala for at risk youth there. (I may not be completely accurate on all that but it's the general gist.) Truly she is an amazing woman!
I have to say that I love my cousin Xela. I'm not sure she could be very much different from me than she already is. She is so tough, adventurous and intelligent. But she also has such a kind heart and such strength. I have so many memories of growing up and spending time with her that I won't even attempt to start sharing stories. She definitely has an adventurous streak to her. My life was more well-rounded for the time I spent with her- and maybe I'm a little tougher for it too. : )
So Xela thanks for stopping by!


PS for all my other relatives: If you come out and visit us you'll get a blog post with nice things about you too. (lol) : )