Happy 40th Anniversary!

Happy 40th Anniversary, Bita & Mina!

Love you,
Leo

*If you don't speak "Leo" Bita and Mina are G'pa and G'ma!

Photo courtesy of Melia Winter Photography.

Happy 2nd Birthday Leo!

Happy 2nd Birthday, Leo!

We love you so much!

Photos courtesy of Melia Winter Photography. A sneak peek of his 2 year pics are available for viewing...

3rd and Final Party

Leo had his third and final party tonight at West Side park. We didn't know when to have a "friend" party, but we'd been invited to a few, so we just decided to go for it. We did make one rule: NO gifts! (The kid has plenty!)

Scott, Amy, Sabrina, Hunter, and Ivy, Joe, Meredith, Reece and Liam, Dan, Elizabeth, David, Aria and Levi all came to help him celebrate!

Justin and I made a basketball cake for Leo (who, we knew, wouldn't eat a bite!) and went with a basketball theme. Here is the crew singing. Thank goodness Elizabeth was there to lead us off!

The weather was great, a little breezy (which blew away all the bugs), and cool. It was so fun to see all of the kids play together, and to visit with the adults. I was told that I could no longer call the Sieperda girls to babysit...Leo hung out with Hunter for most of the evening! (Thanks again for coming Hunter!!)

It was a little too windy to light the candles, but we pretended. :) It was a great night, and Leo talked about his friends throughout his bath and bedtime. "E-am, Reef, Meredif, Mina (this time Sabrina and not G'ma), I-Be, Cott, Unter, Amy and One, Two, Free Babies" (Sorry Elizabeth about the 1-2-3 baby thing...maybe we need to have more play dates!) Thanks so much for coming! It was a lot of fun!

2nd 2nd Birthday Party

Mr. Leo is so loved he got to have another birthday party! This time it was with my side of the family. My entire family was in town celebrating my parents 40th anniversary (more on this in a later post), so everyone got to be at our house for Leo's party.

The morning started out with family pictures in the park. They went smoothly, until the "scary" bridge. Just ask my sister, she'll let you know all about it. (She's kind of a wimp!) Then we went home, ate lunch, and hit the presents. (I wasn't in charge of the camera, so we don't have so many pictures...)

Leo got wonderful presents: Uncle Eric, Auntie Jill and Adri gave him a Mickey Mouse movie (his very favorite show!), Uncle Ben, Auntie Jill, Gavin & Katelynn gave him a golf set (in which the clubs are now used for weapons...), markers, crayons and paper, Melia gave him swim toys for the pool and a bubble gun (we've already used up the bubbles!), and G'pa and G'ma (or Bita and Mina, as Leo calls them) gave him pjs and a basketball hoop. He loved opening his presents, and the help from his cousins! Thanks so much for the gifts!

This picture is the back of the "triplets." It's amazing to me how different they all look and act, but you can tell they all belong in the same family. Katelynn is in the pink, Leo is the only boy, and Adri is in the brown shirt. As I said, we don't have very many pictures!

Hmmm...

I guess I can't be organized or ready for any parties any more. Since Leo has started to enjoy opening presents, I guess I shouldn't have been so shocked to find this...

It was pretty quiet when I thought Leo had gone to his room to get his shoes. When he didn't come back for a few minutes, and I started to hear some strange noises, I knew he was up to no good. I thought I had a week before the terrible 2s hit! Oh well, he looked so darn cute, I couldn't be mad. Just chalk it up to having to wrap presents the morning of the party, not a week before!

Father's Day and Birthday Party!

Yesterday we had Justin's family over for Leo's 2nd birthday! Hard to believe that in just one short week my "angel" will be entering the terrible twos! Yikes! The party was a little on the small side because neither of Justin's sisters were able to make it, but we still had fun!

Leo got into opening the gifts a little more this year. Last year he wanted nothing to do with it. :) Silly boy! He got a Little People Race Set from Uncle Mike, Auntie Erica and Jaina. (P.S. The batteries for this toy are already gone! He LOVES playing with it! Great find, Auntie Erica!)

From G'pa & G'ma he got a Big Wheel. When Jus was little he had one, and wore the front tire out. We'll see what Leo does. He got right on and was driving around the living room. They have one at Kid's Club that is a little smaller, and he loves it there, so he knew what to do when he got on!

At cake time Leo was once again a big ham. If you recall last year, Leo was NOT a fan of the cake. He didn't want to eat any this year either, but he did have his new favorite "I-Beam" (ice cream). I made the cake (out of a box...) and decorated it. I've been watching Cake Boss on TLC, and they talked about using fruit chews to make letters and numbers for cakes. I thought it was a smartie, and I got Fruit Roll-Ups. Um... yeah, these were not what they meant. They meant Starbursts. After wrecking 3 of the roll-ups (bummer, I hate it when you have to eat the mistakes... :)) I finally got his name looking the way I wanted.

Leo had a great "1st" 2nd birthday party! He still has 2 to go!

The Star of the Parade

It's been Rocky's town celebration this weekend. On Thursday Leo and I went to the Whopper Feed (Jus was still under the weather.) and the pet parade. There was a dog, Deuce, who was celebrating his first birthday. You would think he was a little puppy...Yeah right! He weighed 200 lbs! But, oh was he gentle. Leo, of course, thought he was great. There were about 12 dogs in the town square. I'm pretty sure Leo thought he had died and gone to heaven. That boy loves dogs!

On Friday night we went down to the park to watch the Burn Out. For those of you who don't speak Small Town Lingo, a burn out is a bunch of cars burning out their tires. Um, yeah. I don't really see the great fun or the point in all of this. Whatever I guess... Leo was NOT a fan of the noise that they were making (Ok, ok, honestly, it was me. I was not into going to watch the, um, hick activity. SO sorry if you loved the burn out...) So we walked on the bike trail and played at the park. Leo got to do down the BIG SLIDE. Lucky Little Leo. While we were at the park Leo got to see Liam and Reece, some of his favorite playmates.

Today, I got up way too early and headed down to the park to help with the Road Race. I guess I am not the running type, but seriously, the people had to pay $20 to run a 5K or a 10K. Who in their right mind would pay to run? I don't think you could pay me $20 to run that far. There were over 200 people who participated. CrAzY!

After I watched a bit of the race, I went home to my boys. We had to get Leo dressed and ready to get on the float for Kid's Club. They had asked me this week if he could ride, and I thought he'd love it, so off we went. As we got closer to the float, I had these crazy emotions...I started crying because I couldn't believe that my little one was old enough to go on a float. What in the world?!?! We waited for him to walk by with his friends. He was in one of the buggies. When he saw me he waved with a very confused look on his face. It was pretty cute.

Here they come!

Jess "posing" for the camera.

Leo in his buggy ride. (He's the one on the right...)

Kid's Club was given a grant to redo their playground. Woo hoo! No more dirty dirty pea gravel!

Leo really was the star of the parade!

Summer Days Drifting Away...

But oh, those summer nights!

Guess who has been sleeping through the night like a little champ! Yes, it's my Leo! I tell you, it is heaven. I don't feel like I have to go to bed the second he does so I can catch up on some sleep. It's great!

Sorry for the long delay. We have been busy. The first week in June we bummed around, but nothing too exciting. The second week, we all had the stomach flu. (Last year we gave Katelynn this for her birthday. This year she gave us the stomach flu. I think we are even...)

This week we've been hanging out. Jus had strep throat, but knock on wood, Leo and I have stayed healthy! Leo got his 2 year old pictures taken this week by our wonderful photographer. I'll save those for another post. She put a sneak peek on her blog. (She KNOWS how much I hate sneak peeks...but the pictures are great!)

It's sad to say that today is the 20th of June and we still haven't made it to the swimming pool. I have this very bad bad feeling that it will be steamy in September and October. That will make for fun teaching... My goal this week is to get Leo to the pool!

Anyway, I know you all don't want my blabbing, here is a video of my Leo acting like his very best friend, Nike. We don't need a dog, we'll just borrow Nike! (Although, he does a great job of vacuuming up after Leo eats...)

Oh Leo, you are such a charmer. :)

And Leo Was His Name-O!

Isn't my boy a genius? I think he can spell better than I can!

Spike

My uncle used to call my brother, Eric, "Spike" because he had a flat-top hair cut when he was in high school. (He also had a slight mullet, but this isn't the place for that! :))

Leo got his hair cut today, by his favorite Amy, and may have to steal Uncle Eric's nickname.

He looks so darn cute and grown up!

Daddy, We've Got a Problem

Leo's been really good about not needing a paci during the day. The night is a different story, however. I guess I'll take what I can get!

He had one in his mouth after nap yesterday, and left it on the couch. I didn't put it away, and wanted to see what he'd do if he found it. He didn't put it in his mouth! :) He picked it up, and when I asked him to go and put it in his bed, he ran away and came back empty handed.

Progress! I was so excited...until Justin came in and showed me where Leo had put the pacis. They were on "his bed."

Daddy, we may have a bigger problem than the paci.

(For those of you who can't recognize the unmade bed, it's MINE!!! Not Leo's!)