Everybody in the Sandbox!!!!

A couple of Saturdays ago, Emily's friend Isak came over to play. They have a great time playing together. Isak is going to have two baby brothers in August! He's very excited to be a big brother.
Louie was like a little sponge all day, watching everything Isak did and trying to imitate him. He even followed Isak up three stairs! He can do a lot more than I thought!

Isak took Emily for a cruise around the yard in the sandboat. They sure had fun.

Louie

Louie has decided that he's not big on baby food anymore. He's moved up to table food and LOVES it! So far, he's liked everything and is even enjoying Cheerios. Up until now, all Cheerios went on the floor rather than in the mouth.

Emily really likes to try and "help" Lou with his meals.

Grandpa Don's Birthday!

We celebrated Grandpa Don's birthday on Sunday afternoon. It was a beautiful day and a great motivator to get the screen porch all done! Dan and I painted, vacuumed and painted some more to get it all clean and nice. It is so nice to have it done and be able to enjoy it!

Thanks to Grandpa Don and Dan's hard work it's finished before summer even started so we have the whole season to enjoy it.

Dan grilled salmon and baked sweet potatoes and Tesa brought everyones favorite broccoli salad and chocolate sheet cake. Everything was delicious!

The Many Faces of Emily

She is such a happy girl!

and last, THE LOOK!

Tubby Time!

Emily and Louie sure love to play in the tub.
Lou moved from the baby tub to the big tub in March so that his new baby cousin Rebecca could have a baby tub. We were very happy to pass more baby stuff. There's only a couple things left and we'll be free of it all! Yeah!!
Anyhow, Emily showed Lou the proper way to splash so that you can get mom or dad completely soaked. He really caught on quickly.
Now, she just needs to show him how to close his eyes when washing hair. He really hates getting his hair washed.
He's also learning how to drink from a cup, in the tub!

Duck, Duck, Goose . . . .

We walked up to St. Kate's tonight and fed the ducks and the goose. Emily didn't quite get the idea of giving the bread to the ducks. She picked it up off the ground and ate it herself.
Oh well, she had fun walking around with the ducks, trying to give the goose the piece of bread and quacking at everything. Lou wasn't sure what to think of anything. All he knew was that he was also going to eat the bread that was on the ground. The ducks weren't too happy about that though.

Return of great weather!!!

THE LOOK!Yeah, the nice weather is back! Yeah, Dan finally got screens back on our screen porch! Emily and Louie spent the weekend at Grandma and Papa's this weekend, Dan worked on the porch and I went on a scrapbooking extravaganza with some ladies and Tesa. It was fun, but we ate wayyyyy too much food!!!
We bought Emily a big girl seat last weekend because Louie has outgrown his infant carseat. That was a fun trip to Babies R Us. Emily is just entering the major meltdown point in her short life and it is so much fun. She melted down three times in one trip. On a good note, she loves her new seat so much, she sits in it every chance she gets.
Louie is growing fast, I think he skipped the 9 month size of clothes and went straight to 12 month stuff. He seems to go through one growth spurt after another. He also LOVES his solid foods. He's eating three huge meals of it a day, plus bottles. Big guy. . .
The kids got bubbles in their Easter baskets last weekend, they really like them. Can't wait to get them outside. They love to be outside and play in the grass. They were in the sandbox today for the first time this year. We'll see how much sand Lou eats this summer, he's sure to pass Emily's amount from last year.
We walked up to St. Kate's tonight and there were tons of ducks and geese. I forgot to bring the camera with, we're going to walk there again tomorrow and hopefully get some nice pictures. The ducks aren't shy about wanting food, so we'll bring an old loaf of bread with. Should be fun! Emily walked around after them quacking tonight.

Happy Easter!

We celebrated Easter yesterday in the sub zero climate here in St. Paul. The Pelletier's started the day by going to 9:30 mass at Assumption. The church was decorated with beautiful flowers. Emily was her very social self, she walked around before mass started smelling all the flowers on the altar. Both she and Louie were very good at church.

After church, we came straight home to get ready for our Easter celebration with the Tapio's. Grandma and Papa made it back from Florida just in time for dinner. The rolled in at 3:30pm. Emily was very excited to finally see Papa. Everytime the phone rings lately, she looks around and says "Papa!" We had a delicious dinner. Emily went outside with her cousin Billy and walked her doggie and played with her new pinwheel. She had one last year too, but someone stole it with the urn of flowers in the middle of the night. I found a new one at the Family Dollar in Cocoa Beach! She loves her pinwheel.

The Easter bunny came on Sunday morning. I tried to get a picture both kids with their baskets, not a chance. There was NO way Emily was going to sit still for that one. This is the only picture we were able to take of her yesterday. Louie loved his basket and looked like such a little man in his sweater vest. He was ready to head off to junior high! He has really been hamming it up lately whenever there is a camera around!

The bubbles were the favorite in the Easter baskets this year, along with Curious George. He's also from the Family Dollar in Cocoa Beach. (The Family Dollar was a good walking destination there, we (I) got lots of good stuff there.)

A Brief Update

It's been really cold here for the last week. The temperature has been about 30 degress for a high the last few days. The sun has been shining, so it's very deceiving.

Emily's longing to be outside, walking her doggie up and down the block. Oh well, she's enjoying just sitting in the sun for now. She has decided that these boots are fun to walk around the house in. The other day she got up from her nap, put her boots on and sat in the sun.

This is one of my favorite pictures of the kids from Florida. The one day that all four of use went down to the beach to play in the sand. The wind was blowing pretty hard and the water was fairly chilly. It didn't really matter to Louie, he just sat there eating the sand.

Getting Ready for Easter!

We've gone from 82 degrees last Monday to 15 degrees this morning. I'm worried that my beloved peonies, that are already three inches high, will be damaged by the cold. Hopefully not and we'll have some beautiful blooms in a couple of months.

Louie and Emily sure are changing. Lou has gone from crawling with a limp last week to the real thing and fast. He can get from Emily's room to the dog dish in about 15 seconds and that seems to be his primary destination at all times!

We went to the hospital on Saturday morning to meet Emily and Louie's new cousin. Rebecca Ann was born early Friday morning. She has so much hair! Becca weighed in at 10 pounds, 2 ounces and 22 inches! The same size as Louie was at birth. She's a cute little girl. . . We didn't take any pictures though?? When we got home from the hospital, Lou showed us his new trick. He can pull himself up on his knees next to stuff. He's trying so hard to stand, but just can't do it. After his nap, he was up on his knees at the side of his crib, guess we have to lower the mattress all the way down. He's much more ambitious than his sister ever was and can't seem to stay in one place for very long.
We'll see what the future brings. He and Emily are having so much fun together. They're really good at making the other laugh.
Emily's really talking up a storm now. She was standing at the front door, looking across the street saying "Hi Care (claire)! Bye Care!" She LOVES to see the two girls across the street, Claire and Cathryn. Emily thinks Cathryn is so silly.
She's also very ''arful" lately when she's drinking her milk. We've been working very hard to get rid of the sippy cup before Louie's got one. So far, so good. She's very "areful" when drinking her milk.