great forest park balloon race

jessica got onto me for not blogging more (hehehe) so i'm going to TRY!

this is my sister-in-law, sheri and her nieces...

this was a really neat event and it was free! they had pony rides for the kids and play houses. they had a lot of tents set up with businesses set up in them. curves had one. they also had these trampoline gymnast kids there that were amazing!

these are pictures from when brad and i took van to the hot air balloon race. it was so windy that day that the balloons were supposed to go up at noon but they didn't go up until after 5pm. we had to leave before them but sheri took some pictures of them for me.

van was so cute! he just LOVES being outdoors.

Jesus wants me for a sunbeam (teacher)!

I was sustained today as a sunbeam teacher at my church! I teach the 3 going on 4 year olds. They have to be the cutest kids ever! I have 3 boys (Keaton, Carter & Zach) and one girl (Eliza). I thought I would start a post on the funny things they do and say.

7/12/09
This week wasn't too eventful. I only had the 3 boys today. I told them a story about a boy that wanted to grow up to be a missionary and I asked them all what they wanted to be when they grew up. Keaton said he wanted to be a "fire truck boy", Zach wanted to be a "peace man" (I think he meant police man) and Carter wants to be a farmer that drives. I asked them if they wanted to be missionaries too and Carter said no just a farmer. I gave them pictures of a missionary to color and Carter turned his into a pirate with a sword. So far i've learned that they love going outside, bubbles, and "mother may I?"....until next week....

our little family

i'm going to try to be better about writing on here more often....but who knows if i'll actually do it.

this last week brad's brother, rob and his wife, sheri went with us to a park to take a few family pictures! i'm usually the one behind the camera and if not me, brad is. so we only have like 3 pictures of me, brad and van all in one picture!! rob did a pretty good job. we had to wake van up from his nap to take them so he wasn't the happiest baby in these pictures but at least he wasn't crying!

LUAU

our friends, chad and christy had a luau this last weekend and i had to go. i can't wait scrap pictures of vanderlei in a lei! i'm going to call it vanderLEI. i know i'm a dork! but i got some cute pictures! here's a few...

Father's Day

this was brad's first father's day! of course i had to take pictures in the same spot that van and i took on mother's day (for scrapbooking purposes)! brad is such a proud daddy. i love watching him with van. he's always saying how much he loves van and how he can't believe van's our baby!

i'll never forget when we were in the hospital, brad was holding van and he said he would go kevin bacon for van! LOL for those of you who don't get the reference. kevin bacon plays in a movie called 'death sentence' where his son is killed by a gang and kevin bacon pretty much goes crazy and kills everyone in the gang. brad's also wants to be the punisher when he grows up...hehehe.

vanderlei is fearless when daddy's around!

i'm just so grateful to have such a wonderful husband and father to our child!

my baby van is 4 months old!

my little angel gets bigger (and cuter!!) every day! i can't take it! i keep telling him to stop growing but he's not listening to me already. we made a deal yesterday. i love his little toothless smile so much that we decided he could get bigger but he could never grow teeth! i don't think he'll his word on that one but i can always hope!

i think this is my favorite month of his life yet! well nothing can top the day he was born but i'm loving 4 month vanderlei! everyone made fun of me because i swore that i was going to get the first time van rolled over on video. and i have hours of van just laying there! of course i proved everyone wrong!!! the night before van turned 4 months old (6/11/09) he rolled over!! from his back to his tummy! i was SOOO happy that brad and i both got to see it!

so far 4 month van still love, love, loves bath time! his face lights up just hearing the water come on! all you have to say is "splash splash" and van's one hyper baby! we put his little bathtub down inside the tub so when ever he makes a noise it echoes. he "talks" his whole bath! i tried to talk to my sister the other day while van was taking a bath and i couldn't hear her over van! it's so adorable though! he talks a lot actually. not just in the bath. he's so funny too. he kicks and kicks until he's in the deepest part of the tub. he likes to get so far under the water that his legs are hanging off the side and his ears are under water. it makes me laugh! he also pees almost every time in the water. i've gotten to where i hold him so just his legs are in the water for just a minute then i pull him out so he doesn't pee in the water.

he's also realized he can blow bubbles and he does it all day long! of course he already drooling because he's starting to teeth so we spend most of the day wiping his mouth!

i love that he loves food so much. i'm not talking about formula or rice cereal (he definitely loves to eat those) but i'm talking about no matter what we are eating his eyes get so big and he follows every bite you take!

he gets more and more animated every day too! i love his many faces! he smiles on demand all the time now. he also laughs daily now. it's the funniest laugh i ever heard! i wish i could bottle it up and listen to it forever!

anyway, i could go on and on all day about how cute my kid is! i just love being vanderlei's mommy so much!

Mother's Day

This was my first mother's day! I love being a mother! I love holding my baby and I love it when he talks to me and I love it when he's sleeping and when he's awake and how much he loves taking a bath and getting his diaper changed! i love happy baby and sad baby and angry baby! i love how cute he is all the time! i love it when he's sleeping and thinks there's a bottle still in his mouth and he makes a sucking face. i love how good it feels when he's sleeping on your shoulder! i even love staying up all night with him..which i'm pretty lucky because that doesn't happen very often. he sleeps most of the night! pretty much he's perfect...hehehe.

Here's some pictures of the page that Brad and Van made me. Sheri also helped.

van and the bass guitar

every month we take a picture of van next to brad's bass guitar to see how much he has grown....here's a couple of his 2 month pictures.

2 months old

ok so i've been a little busy lately! it's amazing how much time a little one can take up! well van has turned two months old! i can't believe it! he just gets cuter and cuter every day. he doesn't look like a baby with all his hair. he looks like a little boy! i keep thinking he's gonna jump off my laugh and run around....i know i'm a dork! well here's a few pictures of him...isn't he just the cutest baby ever?

Vanderlei is one month old!!

my little baby is already a month old! i can't believe how fast time flies!! he seems like a totally different baby now. he has so much more personality already. and he's way more spoiled now! he knows that he has mommy wrapped around his little baby fingers! he was in such a good mood all day too! i love it when he gets that coy little smile! we took van's picture by brad's guitar so we can see how much he grows in comparison each month!

birthday dinner

jeremy, russ, amber, brad, corinna, van, melissa, reese, amber g., and tara

my friend's, amber griffin and melissa power have february birthdays like me. actually our birthdays are all 3 days apart. mine's the 2nd, amber's the 5th and melissa's the 8th. so starting 4 or 5 years ago we started going out to dinner at la tolteca (a mexican restaurant in columbia, mo). 2 years ago it closed down. we went to red robin last year. this year i was too prego to go anywhere and we decided to wait until i could make it to columbia. ANYWAY, long story short, this year we went to huhot in columbia march 8th. it was nice to see my friends again and huhot was good too!