First of all, let me beg a thousand apologies for not posting pictures in a long, long time. I had a good excuse for a while (college), but the semester's over and now it's just plain procrastination! Anyway, here are the latest pictures from our little family. And yes, I dyed my hair blonde. Grandma doesn't like it, but I think it's fun. I'll probably go darker when fall comes.


This picture was taken at the 2009 Relay for Life, which was held in Louisville, NY this year. We had so much fun last year that we decided to do it again. Hannah, Alex, and I braved sleeping trackside all night (well, they slept while I walked).



This was also at the Relay. It was held at the community center, so there was a great playground. Alex just loved the frog if you can tell from the smile behind the nuk.




The rest of the pictures were taken on the trails at Paul Smiths. We went with a friend of mine from work, Cathy. She just loves to take pictures and especially of my kids! She is an awesome aunt!

Here's Cathy with the kids. Its rare that she actually gets in a picture...she's usually insistent on being behind the camera.

Here's the tireless trailwalkers, hand in hand.

I love this picture! It's got a better backdrop than I could ask for in a studio!

There was a little wooden stage set up on the trail, it even had bleachers set up for the audience. So of course our little starlets had to put on a show.

This is such an adorable picture of Hannah. I had such a horrible picture from Headstart this year that I think I will have this one blown up to put on the living room wall instead! They couldn't get her to smile, can you imagine that?



Here we have a trailweary traveler. The last 20 minutes of the walk, Hannah kept asking me to put her on my shoulders. Finally she found this little spot to rest her weary bones.

Mish Mosh

I have come to realize how behind I am in posting pictures. I apologize in advance for the sheer number of pictures in this post...I couldn't decide which ones to pick and ended up with far more than I intended! Anyway, they are all keepers and most will make you chuckle at the least.

Here, Hannah is concentrating very hard, playing guitar hero. The rest of us found ourselves chanting the colors of the notes she was supposed to play, which just made her more confused because by the time she found the right color, it was already on a different one. Oh well, she had fun anyway!

Here is a group effort at playing "rock band", and though I believe the song was something by Bon Jovi, Hannah was singing a Doodlebops tune.

This is Alex's attempt to play Barbies with Hannah.

This picture needs no explanation. We just partied to hard.

Here, Hannah had injured her finger, yes her finger...though there was no blood or even a mark. Kevin apparently believes that you can never be too cautious. And Hannah was more than happy to play the injured party...and does it quite well for the camera, I might add.

Hannah is joining the bubble blowing extravaganza that we had at my birthday party.

Tyler and I had a bubble war going on. I'm sure the table was quite sticky by the time we were done!



Just hammering away...

The boy has eyes only for his mama.

Alex takes his turn at guitar hero.





These next few pictures were taken by Cathy in my backyard. Alex is just so happy and so incredibly photogenic!

I saw this hat while browsing at the fair, and knew that Hannah would just love it!

Alex has his first taste of cotton candy....

Alex, after helping sissy with her ice cream cone...chocolate obviously.

What a pose!

Alex just loved looking around at all the lights at the fair.

They have a "sandbox" at the fair which is filled with corn. Hannah had to have spent at least 4 hours there. Alex had lots of fun too, until he spit out his pacifier and tried eating the corn.

This is Hannah waiting "patiently" to go on rides.

The Tilt-a-Whirl was Hannah's favorite ride, much to my surprise.

the "horsies"

This picture was from the car wash that we had at walmart. Hannah had a blast helping us wash cars...except she kept trying to wash the ones we had already done...

Why on earth Cathy brought water guns, I have no clue, but she was the first to get sprayed by Hannah...at my coaching of course!

This is Spike. Alex seems to take on another personality when I spike his hair. And he loves being called Spike too.

Here is Alex's first kiss. Courtney wasn't too happy about it, but he was NOT being shy.

This shot was taken the morning after the Relay for Life. We braved the entire night and slept(hah!) in the tent. Alex is mesmerized by the seagulls flying overhead.

What a face!

Hannah is a lot more comfortable in the pool than she was last year and can even doggie paddle with her inflatable swimmies on her arms!

Yes, she is choking me. Ok, so I made the face a little exaggerated, but I finally did have to pry her hands from my neck to open my airway a little.

This picture was taken when we moved into our new apartment!

Spike

Alex chews on everything! Eventually he realized that there was water beyond the chew toy and started splashing instead.

I love the look on his face!

Fireworks, dancing, and field day pictures

Here is Kevin holding Alex at the fireworks. They have lots of fun together.

Hannah has one of those life-size Barbie dolls and the dress actually fits Hannah! She loves to wear it around with her "dance class shoes." Here she is dancing to a song on the radio and having a good old time!

That look scares me....but I won't really start to worry until she's a teenager...hopefully.

In this picture, we were in the high school parking lot waiting for fireworks to start. Needless to say, Hannah was excited.

Again, notice the excitement. It's so funny to watch Hannah's face light up at the smallest things. It really teaches me that you can find joy in the smallest things.

I absolutely love the expression on her face in this picture!

Here is Kathy(she works the craft table at walmart) and Alex. She snatched him up the second we got out of the car and didn't give him back until we left! I guess I can't blame her, knowing what a cuddler he is!

This picture was at the Head Start field day, which took place the day after Hannah's last day of school! It's hard to imagine that a whole year has gone by! Her poppy helped her to make the cute little boxcar with the "H" on the side. She still has it and loves to run around with it! Also notice the "gravedigger" boxcar...sadly it looks meaner than it is...the wheels fell off before the first race!

The day of the field day, it was around 94 degrees out and very sunny. We actually had a tornado watch that day and schools were getting out early. By the time Hannah had her boxcar race, Alex was telling me that it was time to go find some air conditioning and a place to nap. I feel a little guilty sharing this picture, since Alex is such a good baby and hardly ever cries, even when he's tired. I guess he reached his limit finally!

Hannah loved jumping in the inflatable castle! That was her favorite activity at the field day. Before they even had it fully inflated, she was asking me if she could get in it.

Hannah loves hot dogs, and has lately become partial to mustard, but no matter what I do, she just will not eat it in a bun! You can see the bun sitting on her plate on the table. She just plucked the mustard-slathered dog right out of there before I could even blink! But I suppose it's a kid thing!

Here, Hannah is getting ready to slide down the slide. I do believe it is her favorite playground activity. The problem is that at this moment, the box car races are being assembled, and Hannah is supposed to be in her boxcar. I think she got out of it three or four times to go down the slide while everyone was getting organized.

What a sweet smile! She had such a blast that day! She got her face painted with a flower, and had ice cream and a snow cone, a hot dog and some "cheesies" and got to jump in the castle! What more could she want! Well, she didn't want to go home, that's for sure.

What a little Ham! It's getting harder and harder to get candid shots of Miss Hannah Mae! She loves the camera, depending on who's wielding it, and is always ready with a grand pose.

Alex is having a little pow wow with his buddies Pooh and Tigger. Cathy and Kathy from my work got them for him for Christmas. He's finally getting to be their size!

This is Spike. Every now and then, I will put some gel in Alex's hair and that is what Hannah calls him while his hair is spiked. He seems to enjoy the alter ego.

This was my lesson in keeping things out of Alex's reach. We were in the middle of dinner and I turned to Hannah to help her cut something up, and then I heard a splat. Now, that is never a good sound, but I was too curious not to turn around. I found the baby food container on the floor, resting right side up. Thinking I had escaped a real mess, I picked it up and got up to get a dishcloth to clean up the small splatter on the floor....when I turned back to the table, this picture is what I saw. But Alex was having such a good time, I didn't have the heart to be mad! Especially after I saw how the next picture came out...

What a proud face that is.....look what I can do, mama!



Sorry about the direction of the video, I couldn't figure out how to rotate it....it's worth the stiff neck!