happy b-day, dame!

dame turned 32 this month! he spent the weekend in las vegas with his dad and brother and had a really good time. when he came home we surprised him (sort of) with a cake. i say sort of because as soon as we picked him up from the airport maddie asked if we could have happy birthday cake now. and yeah, dame figured it out right away.

anyway, raylee decorated it with his favorite undersea friends. she also decorated maddie's cupcake so she wouldn't feel left out. she even put a candle on it for her. here are a couple pics. oh, and the cake was actually a brownie. i'm horrible at making cakes. but dame liked it!

the finger test

maddie is in a new phase. she's getting her finger stuck in everything since she can't resist testing small openings to see if her finger will fit. this time it was in the back of her cement truck. dame came home right as i took this picture and came to her rescue. his reaction: help maddie. my reaction: get the camera! :)

our "toot" turtle friend

we had a little visitor on our door step a couple weeks ago... he made it all the way up to the door mat before he turned around and headed back to the front garden where i took these pics. i really do love turtles. maddie does too. she squealed with delight "he's so cute!" when she saw him. (i'm translating for you. what she actually said was "he so toot!")

as requested... here's another video of noel. :) this is a few weeks old, though, when he was first catching on to rolling over. he's a pro now. isn't his smile great? he smiles all the time --such a happy baby! :)

get in the tub and under a blanket?

well forget the "lovely weather" i mentioned a bit ago. we've had some tornadoes in the area! coming from the west coast this is a very traumatic thing for me. earthquakes?? no problemo. i've been known to roller skate during those. but tornadoes?? uh, no thanks. we don't have a basement and our house is a single story so when we're under a tornado warning we're supposed to get in the middle of the house (the master bath as it turns out) and put a blanket over us. hm... dame says that reminds him of his days in the army when they'd have nuclear explosion drills (i forget the official term for it) and were told to curl up in a ball as tight as they can with their helmets directed towards the oncoming explosion. i just don't see how either scenario is going to help much. good thing i can rest assured knowing that my God is in control. because i'm sure a blanket wouldn't be the thing that saves me if disaster strikes.

video of noel laughing

apparently the lighting isn't so great in this video (ya' can't see a thing) but it's the sound of noel laughing that made me want to post it and share it with you. so, turn on your volume and sorry about the dark picture. if you look closely you might see noel throwing his head back when he laughs. :)

our little... princess?

This is what happens when I let Maddie pick out what she's going to wear for the day (everything except the sweater --that was my addition). She originally asked for her Shrek hat, but since that wasn't available she asked for her Spongebob hat instead. And, yes, I ran errands with her looking like this.

a sunny day

Maddie, Noel and I went to the playground up the street the other day. I just thought I'd post some of the pictures I took for you all to see. The weather has been lovely this past week. Today, though, it has started to rain and we've been having thunder storms. But, it should clear up before too long and get nice again. :)

Here's Maddie burying a pine cone.

And here she is getting "stuck" on the play equipment.
Here I am with Noel.
Maddie's looking at turtles. This pond is full of them.
She didn't want to leave --and I didn't blame her. But, there are no bathrooms there so we had (I had) to go. :)

scraped knees

Well, I do believe these are Maddie's first official scraped knees. She was running in the driveway and took a fall which resulted in her "owie boo-boos." This was last week, and just yesterday she fell on them again making them fresh all over again.

playing together

I don't know who loves to play with this toy more --Maddie or Noel?
Noel loves it when Maddie is playing with him. She's really good at keeping him entertained. Actually, she's quite good at keeping us all entertained. :)