Summer Lovin!

I started my countdown to summer vacation right after Spring Break this year.  I was THAT excited to be a full-time, stay-at-home mommy for the summer.  It has been such a challenging year for me trying to give 100% to not only Colin and Kellen, but also to my career.  It was a learning experience, to say the least, to figure out how to evenly balance all the things I care so deeply about.  In the end I think I did a pretty good job (Colin may say otherwise...HA!).  Now that the year is said and done, I can focus all my love and attention on my two favorite boys and truly enjoy the next several weeks as a wife and mommy.  Here are just a FEW of the several pictures of utter summer bliss...

                              Kellen and his "COOL" shades
                                 Playgroup at our house
                                      One of summer's finest delicacies!
                                     Discovering the fun of mommy's jewelry!
                                   Conor and Kellen at the Blueberry Field
                                  Enjoying the blueberries!

          Tasting our famous cookies after helping mommy make them

"BOOM!" Day

We spent 4th of July at my mom's beach house in Waldport.  It has been a tradition we've started a few years ago.  Waldport has their fireworks show on the beach the night of the 3rd and then we head down to Yachets for their very unique 4th of July parade on the 4th.  It was a blast!  The whole family was able to make it this year (the FIRST time!!).  To see this celebration through the eyes of a 16 month old with my family is priceless!  Kellen's vocabulary has expolded these last couple of weeks and whenever their was a firework that went off in the sky, he would yell "BOOM!".  After several "BOOMS!" our lil' monkey fell fast asleep in my arms.  Hey, I give him HUGE props for staying awake through half of the show!!  

Speaking of Kellen's vocabulary...Over the weekend Anna asked me "How many words can Kellen say?".  I decided to actually count them up.  Anna and I counted 72 words before giving up.  Yup, 72 WORDS!!!  Our little man is a talker!!  He is repeating everything we say and Colin and I have officially begun donating to a swear jar to help us keep things G-rated.  :-)  Here is a slide show of the weekend since there are way too many fun pictures to post.  Enjoy!!!

 

Hiatus is Officially Over!

It has been forever since I've written on this Blog and I apologize to anyone out there that has been disappointed with the lack of updates.  I promise that I will be updating more often now that I am off for the summer and have a bit more time.

A lot has happened since March.  I'm going to do a short recap of the most exciting events followed by some of the pictures that go with the updates over the last few months.  Here we go....

Spring Break:  I spent the heavenly week home with Kellen catching up on some Mommy-and-Lil' Monkey time.   We met our playgroup friends Lori and Ava at The Children's Museum.  This place is incredible!!  Kellen loved the Gravel Pit and anything that had water!!  This will definitely be a place we'll visit a lot during the summer.  One morning I woke up before Kellen, a RARE occurrence, and decided to get his breakfast ready.  After finishing, he was still sleeping so I decided to jump into the shower.  To make a long story short, I showered, blowed my hair dry, did my makeup, picked up the house and at 10:30am I thought to myself 'I better go check on Kellen to make sure he is okay'.  I went into his room and found him fast asleep sitting up with his burp rag aka "Maymay" in his mouth!!  Sweetheart!  Needless to say I ran for the camera and got this priceless shot (see below).  He ended up waking up a few minutes later. 

                            At the Children's Museum with Ava.

                    My lil' Monkey Fast Asleep at 10:30am!!!
                     Kellen enjoying sitting on a pile of shoes!

Grandma and Grandpa's Wedding Anniversary:  This "surprise" was a fun one.  Pat and Suzanne met everyone at Who Song and Larry's on the river for dinner, cake, and some great company.  It was wonderful to see all the family there celebrating such an incredible milestone.  Happy Anniversary, Pat and Sue!

Easter:  We spent Easter Sunday heading to the neighborhood park to do some Easter egg hunting.  I've been practicing all week with Kellen to collect as many eggs as you quickly can and put them in your basket.  He had that down pat, but tended to dump the entire basket of eggs on the floor once collecting.  I was hoping he wouldn't do the latter at the actual Hunt.  Well, he did, of course, but mommy and daddy came to the rescue and scared away all the grade schoolers that were trying to steal Kellen's dumped eggs.  Yup that's right Kellen, mommy and daddy got your back!  HA HA!!  That evening we went to Grandma and Grandpa Fitzgerald's house for Easter dinner.  Dinner was as delicious as always, and having Kellen able to sit at the table and eat with us was just a delight! He didn't care much for the mashed potatoes, but loved the rolls.

The Zoo:  We met Cassie and Bella at the zoo where they were able to pet the goats and catch a glimpse of the baby elephant.  It's amazing how much Kellen understands now.  It's almost like you can see the actual thinking process going on as you are explaining things to him.  Such an incredible lil' man!

Friends and Family BBQ:  We had Kieran, Anna, The Eatons, and Stephanie & Zack over for a last-minute BBQ.  Since Colin has gotten our deck railing put up and looking quite spectacular, we wanted to share our excitement with an old fashioned Fitzgerald BBQ.  Bella and Kellen were playing all night long and especially liked bath time and running around in their birthday suits to Kieran's singing and guitar playing.  

Mother's Day:  What a wonderful day!  I think Mother's Day should be EVERY day!  Such a fabulous day to remind everyone what a gift it is to be a mother and to be acknowledged for it.  Colin never fails to surprise me.  He has got to be the most thoughtful husband on the planet!  I have been mentioning how much I wanted a squirrel feeder for our backyard for months now and finally gave up when Colin's reaction was "It'll attract more than just squirrels" each time.  Well, Kellen's gift was the infamous squirrel feeder along with a huge bag of corn on the cob for the furry lil' creatures!  YAY!!!  Knowing that it's been quite the challenging year for me not only trying to balance a career and motherhood, but also because my class was a class I will NEVER forget (not in a good way), Colin gave me a gift certificate for a massage!  What a PERFECT gift to go along with my PERFECT family!!  ;-)

The Beach with Great Friends:  We have scheduled this weekend for quite some time now and we were so excited when it finally came.  The Mandics, Rocklins and us headed down to my mom's beach house for a lil' R&R and catch up time.  We were able to visit the beach briefly (So cold and windy!), enjoy dinner at the Rogue Brewery, and the boys were able to get some golfing in.  Kellen and Reece (the Mandics toddler) got along great.  I think a lil' crush started to develop on Kellen's end.  :-)  It was also Kellen's first time on the beach and in the sand since he's been walking.  He had such a fun time and managed to eat a few hand fulls of sand.  I still don't quite understand this "Hmmm...Wonder what this tastes like?" mentality.  Thought it would go away by now....

   

Father's Day:  Another great day that should be celebrated more than just once a year.  We all know how much we treasure a guy who does the daddy thing whole heartedly.  Colin is that guy.  He is one of the most passionate dad's I have ever seen!  He loves Kellen to pieces and to see Kellen look and say "dadda" whenever he leaves the room, I know that love is mutual.  Kellen is truly blessed to have such an incredible man to look up to.  I cannot wait to see the unbreakable bond that these two will develop once Kellen gets over the "I want my mommy only" phase.   Since I am not the best camera sharer, I decided to give Colin his own.  I have to admit it is WAY COOLER than my camera and takes deliciously crisp pictures.  Colin was very excited and started right away as a true photographer.  Happy Fathers Day, Colin!  We love you very much!!!  

Uncle Kieran & Brendan, the Musicians:  We get a phone call one evening from Kieran, Brendan and Heather wanting to visit the nephew.  We were delighted to have them over.  Kieran and Brendan played some guitar and the music lover that Kellen is, instantly became glued to their hips.  His focus and dance moves proves that he very well may follow the musical footsteps of his uncles.