This morning

Luke got up at 7:10 (he got up at 12:30 and 5:00, too) Those two teeth are taking a toll on him right now - slight fever, lower energy, lesser appetite, but still smiling because he is just that kind of kid.

We picked Gma Jackie up at Panera to get her to work on time b/c her car is getting fixed from some recent hail damage. We all enjoyed seeing her (the dogs were along for the ride, of course) and getting her to SIU.

After we dropped her off we headed south for a trip to Bald Knob cross. Steve, Luke and I are participating in a fundraiser walk for the cross in a couple of weeks and I have been curious to see what state it is in plus Luke has never been there so off we went. Luke was great on the way and we spent about an hour eating breakfast outdoors, walking around and watching the dogs romp. GOOD GOOD FUN and a beautiful drive there and back.

Bald Knob is a stunning spot in S. IL. It has fabulous scenic overlooks and you are at the 'tops of the trees' when you get to the cross which is always breathtaking. I will always remember Luke walking around the picnic tables and throwing gravel around any time I go back. The cross is normally covered in white tiles, but it is being restored so seeing its skeleton is kind of interesting. It will be lovely once it is restored with clean new tiles.

Luke is grasping the idea of DROP IT. Instead of trying to eat everything he picks up (rocks, gravel, rocks, more rocks) I kept saying drop it and he did...very cool. He knocked out on the way home and is getting some good teeth-growing restorative sleep as I type.

Happy weekend!

A (good) day in the life-

-of Luke. I was going to write this as if Luke was writing it, but then I thought that might seem kind of dumb so I am just going to explain what Luke did today and one day when he is curious (yeah, right!) he can read about his day :) This is a little wordy so if you are looking for pictures (DAD!) just scroll to the bottom.

He woke up at 1:30am and Dad was quick to get in his room with some milk and some loving for him. He went back to sleep pretty quickly and slept until 6:30. I noticed today that his 2 top incisors are right at the surface of his gums so that probably explains the night waking since he has been sleeping so well lately.

At 6:30, Daddy got him up and changed him. He is not very happy about getting changed these days. I will sing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" to distract him or just make funny noises. He also got half of a banana, some dry cereal and some juice. I got up pretty quickly, too, and walked the dogs because we all were planning on the tree guys coming this morning to complete our oak job...didn't happen but that is a whole other post that isn't really worth writing about;)

After his wake-up snack, Luke tooled around the house with me for a while discussing our plans for the day, then enjoyed some time with his toys while mom got a quick shower and got ready for the day. I got him dressed, packed up his snack and drink and headed to Lowe's. Luke was great in his new car seat that Steve installed yesterday. We are keeping him in a rear facing car seat as long as possible (hopefully until 2 years old) but he really needed a new seat that will adjust to his ever-growing healthy body!

We have visited Lowe's a lot lately, it seems, and one of the women working today remembered Luke and kept raving about how great his behavior is and how cute he is. He loved every second of it. He would act shy and put his head on my arm when she would talk to him, but when she left he would look up like 'where is my friend?'.

After our shopping we barely made it on time to this week's Wiggles 'N' Tunes class. So fun, even if Luke spent every chance he could find to try to leave the room or to explore Teacher Alyce's 'stuff' He was getting tired by the end of class and did pretty well, but it was a challenge to keep singing about the animals on the farm while keeping him in the classroom! He is a determined and independent little guy.

We got home from class, snacked on some yogurt, read a couple of Curious George books and then he tried to tell me how horrible I am when I put him down for a nap at about 11:00. He repeated his disdain for me for about 5 minutes and then all was quiet and he took a great nap. Woke up happy, looking around the room calmly deciding if he needed to make a sound or if I was close enough by to get him without yelling for me (I was - I love checking on him when he sleeps and I LOVE getting him from a nap - he is so snuggly for a second and just wonderful to hold while he wakes up)

I was working on some shelves so Luke was excited to see and hear a drill being used while he rearranged a couple of the kitchen cabinets. Once the shelves were done, he ate a good serving of pasta (with black olives, of course) and some strawberries. He looked like he had taken a bath in cherry koolaid by the time lunch was over!

We put some sunscreen on and spent some time on the deck. Luke checked out his water table and explored the deck a little while I re-potted a few plants before we headed out front to get some shade. Summer showed up today!

We kept working on some plants and Luke was interested in taking laps around my car. When daddy got home Luke got some playtime with him, we took the dogs for a walk and Luke played some more with Daddy while I made dinner.

My folks came over to share the carbonara with us and Luke got a kick out of screaming at the top of his lungs if we went too long talking to each other instead of focusing on him. It is pretty funny. He is grasping SO many ideas now and you can ask him all kinds of things like "where is mommy/daddy/grandma" and he will look immediately at the person. He also gets things - I will ask him to get the ball/book/frog/etc...and he just does it. The learning of a baby/toddler is mind blowing. Gma Susan noticed that he grabbed "Green Eggs and Ham" when she offered to read it to him which was a thrill for her and we are all enjoying the fact that he will sit still for a few pages of books now before taking over or taking off!

Luke is just an absolute joy. After dinner he got his bedtime bottle, loved on the dogs and his frog and hedgehog and slept all night. Before he went down, we went out front to admire the moon flower that BLOOMED this week. What a glorious blossom, what a glorious scent. It is a total treat to watch a flower bloom as the moon rises.

Tons of pics

Playing with daddy's belt. This is our screensaver right now. It is going to take one heck of a picture to replace it. He is just so adorable!
Walking over to the wondow to see what is going on...probably a big truck picking up tree debris - very exciting. The driver of one took a liking to Luke and would wave and honk the horn when he came to pick up at our house.
We have been trying to get together with Claudia and Ruby once a week or so for a walk and fun visit. All three dogs ride in my car and then enjoy romping in a nearby lake before we leash them for the walk. It is a much calmer walk when they have burned some major energy running around. Good, good fun!

Luke really wants to use the spoon now. He gets annoyed when I try to feed him so luckily it is warmer out and he can eat shirtless and get yogurt or whatever anywhere. He does pretty well, actually, and Luna loves to clean up whatever misses his mouth!


Luke with Becca, a wonderful woman that I had lots of adventures with while in Morocco. Becca was in the area visiting in-laws and I am soooo glad she met us at the St. Louis Zoo. It was really really hot and really really crowded, but it was great to see her and catch up a little bit. In a few months, Becca will be an RN and any of her patients will be fortunate to have her working with them!
We were in the children's zoo petting area. They have some super chill goats. Luke was not really interested, but he did like to hold on to their horns (antlers? whatever?)
The next few pictures are of Luke playing at the water area of the children's zoo. They have a small area for kids to jump through the fountains and chase the water which really interested him.


Luke made a friend at the zoo named Lily. She was adorable and super sweet to him. She was very curious about why he had shoes on, what his name was, why he was holding my hand, etc...and kept coming back to visit with him. I think he liked her :)

This is Lucas and Luke. Lucas' mom, Jen, is a blogging friend that I have met a couple of times. The boys are about three months apart and it was just wonderful to get them together. Lucas was HILARIOUS with the water - laughing, running, loving every minute of the playtime, whereas Luke was a little more cautious and investigative. They were just great and Jen is a great mom. It is always a treat to spend some time with another mom that is easy to talk with and I hope we will get together again soon.
My post zoo pic of a tired boy. He slept about 30 minutes on the way home, stayed up until about 10 and then slept until 8 on Saturday morning. What a great kid!

This weekend has been good fun. We just got home from seeing Terminator and going to a cookout in Herrin and have enjoyed spending time with Steve's parents and brothers. Luke's uncles are really good to him - it is fun to see them play with him and love on him. And...tomorrow is a holiday so we get more time to hang out with Steve! Yeah! Happy weekend...

I missed Mother's Day

so here are some recent pics of me and my babe. He is waving at everyone now and absolutely on the verge of running around the block on his own!

I went to breakfast with my dad and Luke yesterday which was a good time. Luke was grabbing pieces of my blueberry pancake off of my plate he was so into it. A lady sitting nearby stopped me to say that Luke had the sweetest voice. I thought it was a really unique and nice compliment to get. He does make really sweet sounds, even when he sounds rough and tough!



This pic and the next one are faves of mine b/c I caught how he gives love. He will lean into me and let me kiss his cheek. It is a pretty great moment and so I ask him if I can give him love lots. He will lean in for kisses, too, if you ask. Strawberries are in season so I noticed today that when I got close to love on him he smelled like strawberries which was absolutely precious. He LOVES strawberries, by the way. I give them to him at the end of a meal or else he won't eat anything else!

I just needed to post this shot of Luke from the storm day. I think his face sums up how a lot of people were feeling with all of the damage and stress going on around the area. It got really warm out after the storm hit, so I let him walk around naked and just get dirty which he really enjoyed. It is wild to think about his mobility a week ago - it was still limited to him walking when he was holding onto something -and how today he is just walking everywhere on his own.
There is no way I could do a post talking about photos of my babe without including one of my #1 babe assessing the storm damage. LOVE THIS PIC/LOVE THIS GUY!

Writing from home

loving having his tray filled with water to splash in after one of our outdoor dinners (thank goodness the weather has been nice!)
our happy boy holding mom's accessories
It is a messy home, there is still tree debris everywhere, etc... but we do have power. It is nice to just get on the computer and check email, although the power being out was nice b/c it take all of those distractions out of the way. Steve and I are going no tv/computer on Mondays and Thursdays this summer. We will get more practice with no tv this weekend since the digital stuff isn't working anyway.

Luke is walking like crazy, getting another molar and he has learned how to re-wire our entire street from watching the guys work ALL DAY yesterday. They were really amazing.

I would like to find a cleaner that you spray in the air and around your house that just puts things back the way that they were pre-storm :)

Mean May

Writing this from Steve's office at the high school since they do have power :) We have been without power since Friday, there is still a utility pole on our shed and lines down all over the yard. Our wonderful BIG oak tree is nearly all gone and all of S. Il is picking up from the wild storm (tornado/inland hurricane/crazy ass weather) that came through on Friday.

Luke, on the other hand, keeps taking more independent steps, is happy, likes eating meals outside since there is more light out there and is all around a great little kid.

Glad everyone is okay and that the damage isn't worse.

Helping out

So Luke was a huge help today as I rearranged a bedroom into a playroom. As you can see, he had a lot more fun playing peek-a-boo from inside the closet than helping me move furniture. I had more fun doing that, too!

Actually, though, I am really happy with the room now. He has easy access to lots of different toys and it is nice to have the room organized.


His feet are cute, plus I wanted to get a photo of the box that he kept climbing into trying to reach a frame that he was interested in...He is very interested in climbing. I had a brainy idea to make a table "Luke height" so I propped a folding table up on two cinder blocks (with pillows around them). I imagined we could stack blocks, maybe start coloring or doing simple art projects. Well, Luke just wanted to climb up and down off of it taking a second to sit on it and then take a header off of it and start over. The table has now been dismantled.

I really like how his face changes as he gets bigger and realizes that he can manipulate his expressions. I think he looks like a grown man in the first picture.

He also is getting really good at an amazingly cheesy huge smile when he gets something he is after (esp. if it is something he probably isn't supposed to have!) He knows that if he smiles big, everyone will smile with him and he might get to hold onto the forbidden item for a moment longer - smart boy ;)

Please know that the bruise on his head is healing quickly and nicely. It is hard to look at, but you can see that it doesn't slow him down or keep a smile off of his face.

Back to life...

...back to reality!

Steve and I had a weekend of fun together and Luke had a great time with both sets of Grandparents. We really enjoyed having the time together and we also were really excited to see Luke on Sunday!

Here is Luke tonight during his bath. The photo is from my phone which explains the mediocre quality. He gets really focused now about pulling the drain plug and then when the water goes away he is puzzled. He is totally willing to stay in the tub and play with the bubbles and toys anyway.

This bathtime photo is an example of reality for us now and I think we are pretty lucky. He is really a wonderful and happy little boy. The last couple of days we have been busy. I have been trying to have morning be funtime and in the afternoons we run errands, etc...I like having a little structure and I like having some plan for each day even more.

It was a beautiful day today. We took Gma Jackie a coffee (get well soon mums!) and then headed out to Cedar Lake with the dogs. They were really good about staying away from any fisherman and Luke was thrilled to watch them swim and try to throw rocks in the water like I was doing. He is learning EVERY SECOND! Later we went to the park and Gma Jackie met us. Luke did some dancing under the gazebo and made her smile which was worth the visit. It is hard to see Gma keep her distance from Luke since she is sick. He would put his arms up or try to walk to her and she would RELUCTANTLY tell him no b/c she has a cold...

Later, (after he got the biggest goose egg he has had yet - I won't write about that b/c it makes me feel bad that he even fell) we played with the dogs and I would hand him a stick and name one of the dogs and Luke would move to whichever one I named to give her the stick. Very fun!

Sharing

These are some pictures of Luke sharing his toys with Luna. When I ask him where Luna or Star is he looks for them, and when he gets a cracker or snack if I say let's give one to Luna he immediately hands her one...she really likes that :) It is obvious everyday how many new words and ideas he understands. Anyway, the mini-football in this picture has a squeak toy inside so she really was excited that he was willing to share it with her.

Happy May!