Grandma Margie's and Grandpa Eric's visit

Here are just a few of the pictures taken with Grandma Margie's camera while her and Grandpa Eric visited.

From the moment I told Tori months ago that Grandma Margie was coming to visit when the baby was born she has been asking if Grandma was going to make cinnamon rolls when she came. Tori became very anxious for the baby to be born so she could get some cinnamon rolls (I don't blame her - they're really good). These are a few pictures of them making the rolls together. Tori loves doing anything with flour - as you can tell from the pictures.

Grandma was also very fun and helped Tori build a fort, which she promptly filled with blankets, stuffed animals and books - looks really cozy to me.

So, Tori learned how to do the fireman-pole at the park all by herself this summer. She is so proud of her new accomplishment and wants to do it constantly. The funniest thing is that she is still a little nervous when she does it and tries to keep one foot on the playground as long as possible before she finally has to put it on the pole, too.

A few more park pictures below - you can see James is getting in on the fun, too.

James trying to give dad a little punch.

Tori has a been a wonderful big sister and loves to help take care of James. I've been very impressed with how gentle and caring she is with him. She loves to make him happy and he just beams whenever he sees her. Below is a video of her trying to sing him a lullaby (sorry it is really quiet, you can barely hear her, but I still thought it was cute).

First Baths

Here are some pictures of James's first couple baths. As long as the warm water was being poured on him he loves his baths and Tori loves to help.

Above you can see Tori's little arm holding the wash-cloth and washing James. At first Tori said she didn't want to have a bath together with James because, "There's not enough room in the tub." I have since convinced her that there is plenty of room and they love having baths together - I just never remember the camera when they are both in the tub.

James comes home

Here are just a couple of cute pictures of the day after James came home. I love the one where he is smiling in his sleep (John is great at getting those cute smiling pictures).

John and Tori had a ton of fun spending lots of time together (playing games, going to the movie "Up", playing dress-up) while I took care of James. Though we all are incredibly happy, we're also all very exhausted. A day or two after James came home I told John that he needed to go wake Tori up from her nap (so she'll actually go to sleep at night). Well, 20 minutes later he hadn't come back so I went to check on them and below is a picture of what I found.

Welcome James Allan

After years of trying to get him here - our beautiful little boy, James Allan, arrived on his due date, June 10th, 2009 weighing 8 lbs 5.4oz and he was 21.5 in long. Above is a picture of me on the way to the hospital (I look happy and calm because I was induced). And below are pictures about 10 hours later of James and family at the hospital.

Tori was thrilled to be a big sister, however, below is what she would do every time James started to cry. I didn't blame her, since James's cry isn't the quietest thing when he's really upset.


These are pictures of James all dressed up to go home. I like that you can see in these pictures his really long fingers. One of the first things we noticed when he was born (besides all his wonderful hair) were his big hands and long feet - I think he's going to be pretty tall, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

We couldn't be happier with our sweet, wonderful boy!

Soccer videos

Here area few videos ofTori playing soccer this spring. They're pretty long, but I thought they were entertaining. Tori had a lot of fun playing, even though she was more interested in playing around with friends than actually kicking the ball.

Dance Recital and Dress Rehersal

These are a bunch of pictures of Tori in her dance costume with her make-up for her very first dance recital. With how much she loves dance this will probably be the first of many. One of the things she was the most excited about was getting to wear lipstick.

These are pictures of Tori and her friends in dance class during the dress rehearsal at the dance studio. Above - I asked Tori to pose for me and that is her pose.

Above from left to right - Tori, Megan, Claire, Anne, Lauren.

Below are all the girls from the 3 dance classes Tori's age that did the recital together.

These are pictures after the recital was all done. Tori was soooo excited to get real flowers - especially her roses from Dad. I was really excited to be at the dance recital because it was just 4 days before my due date with James (luckily he came right on his due date).

Below are videos of the recital and dress rehearsal right before hand. I included both since during the actual recital Tori had a hard time finding a spot so she starting dancing a little late (their instructor told them to find a dot on the ground to dance on, but I don't think there were enough dots, but Tori was determined to find a "dot" to dance on). I'm just proud that she kept on dancing and did such a good job remembering all the steps.