Brooklyn

Here is our princess at 18 months. She was not happy she was still awake, but this picture captures so much of who she is. She loves Minnie and Micky Mouse, and tries to wear this dress out of the dirty clothes! She is starting to talk like crazy, and loves playing with her babies. She has a little attitude, all from her daddy! 

Practicing their crazy face! We'd say she looks just like Tia! At her 18 month check-up, she was 26 pounds, 9 ounces, 80% and 33 inches tall, 85%. She is slowly loosing some of her baby fat, which is sad, but good for Mikelle since Brooklyn always wants her to hold her.

She loves food, but not just in her mouth. She loves to rub it all over, especially on her face and in her hair! The other day, she took her bagel, rubbed her hand all over the cream cheese, then rubbed it all over her face. This picture is of her and her macaroni and cheese. She could realistically have a bath after every meal. Jackson was just the opposite. It is funny to see how totally different they are, except for the cheeks!!

Jackson

Here is our handsome boy at wacky hair day. To him, a mohawk  is wacky! At least all the color added to it! Everyone loved it. Luckily for him we went to the doctor after and shopping so lots of people could see it. He is really getting into video games, argh. He has to play with mom most of the time since dad is gone most of the time, and it is hilarious since Mikelle was never into video games. They are both learning together, and getting quite good at Lego Batman and Lego Indiana Jones!

Preschool graduation, from Happy Meadows Preschool. He will  go there next year too, but it was fun to have a little ceremony for the kids. 

His teacher, Miss Janna. He loves her, and her husband Mr. Dave. He is already missing them now school is out. Oh to be little again!

Our sweet boy. He is actually giving us a run for our money lately. Not liking 4 much, but hopefully he won't always be so defiant! He did give us a scare the other day when he slipped and fell on his elbow. We thought it was broken, but luckily not. That would have ruined summer in the Valley of the Sun!

San Francisco

This last weekend Bobby and Mikelle were able to steal away for a few days. Bobby has been working out of town for the last couple of months, and was just transferred to San Francisco a few weeks ago. What better time to go see it! Mikelle's mom watched the kids with a little help from her dad and Kristin. They are the best. We had such a good time. We got to stay downtown, so we walked almost everywhere, but also got familiar with BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit), the cable cars, the buses and even taxi's. A great place to visit, but we couldn't imagine living there, especially with kids.

Here we are at Pier 39 with Alcatraz in the background.

Here is Bobby in a cell in the D block (isolation) of Alcatraz. We loved this tour. They do a walking audio tour, which is fantastic and we learned so much. It was cold and windy, but despite that, it was well done with the amount of tourist there.

Here is the Warden's house. Did you know most of the guards working at the prison lived on the island with their families? Crazy! 

Lombard street is San Francisco's crookedest street. It was crazy.  Why anyone would build it, let alone live on it is beyond us.

This is a cool fountain that the kids were playing in and around right across from the Ferry Building. We also had fantastic Thai food near by at Osha Thai Restraunt and Lounge and of course Boudin's bakery was there too! Really we ate our way through San Francisco. The Burger Bar is good, as is Tony's Pizza in Little Italy!

This little rodent scared Mikelle half to death as she stepped near it's hole and it popped out. Mikelle screamed and made quite a scene, then had to take pictures because he was so cute!

This is Sutro Baths on the other side of the island. We had a lot of fun walking around and seeing remnants of what used to be there, which was a big swimming pool complex, with fresh and salt water pools! 

This is more of an overview shot. Way worth the crazy taxi ride we took to get there, but we took the bus home. Wasn't near as scary! 

The Park

The last few weeks we've really been trying to take advantage of the cool mornings before summer really hits. Jackson loves to ride his bike to a park and play, and Brooklyn loves a good push in the stroller, as long as she gets to play at the park too! Here Jackson is helping his sister. He really is a great big brother. 

A rare picture of him with an actually smile, not all  cheesy like. So cute, just can't resist taking photos! You'll notice his left eye looks a little red and puffy. He has a chalazion, which is like a stye, but it's not going away. The doctor said we may have to operate if it doesn't drain in the next two weeks. Poor boy. We are doing warm compresses and we have to put drops in his eye, which he hates, but hopefully it will pop on its own.

This picture just cracks us up! She is our little dare devil. She has no fear and loves the park.  She thinks she can do anything the other kids do, and really just likes to scare her parents!

Easter

The Friday night before Easter we went into Mesa to The Natural History Museum. They had a dinosaur egg hunt. It was actually super fun. The kids were allowed to find 5 eggs, then if they found more they could re-hide them. And the staff kept putting out eggs, so there was no problem finding them. Jackson loved it and Brooklyn did too, she just liked the re-hiding part the best!

Of course we had lots of egg hunts in the back yard,. Brooklyn did pretty good.

Jackson couldn't get enough. The more hunts the better.

Here is a picture of Brooklyn helping decorate the eggs. She got to do the shrink wraps! She is saying cheese for the photo if you can't tell.

Jackson loved dying eggs. We had superhero dye, of course!

The kids loved the baskets the Easter Bunny left. Brooklyn especially liked the candy. Nothing like a handful at a time, before breakfast!

One of the better pictures we took. 11 o'clock church is hard for Brooklyn, and she was so tired, but it could have been much worse! The boys looked so sharp in their ties, and Jackson wants to wear his every week. This week it was with a green shirt! We got these ties online at thematchingtieguy.com. So many cool choices!

More egg hunts at Aunt Kendra's and Uncle Barry's. The kids got to use real eggs, so they were super excited!

It also helps that their yard is landscaped, so there are way more places to hide the eggs!

Kiddos

Brooklyn has moved from trying to swallow your head when she kisses to giving actual kisses, and she loves to kiss. She especially loves to give brother kisses before naps and bed.

One of Brooklyn's favorite toys are dolls and one of her favorite things to do with dolls, change their diapers. She gets really upset with the ones that don't have diapers that come off!

One of Jackson new things is to get two different socks to wear, and of course, Brooklyn has to follow him. She takes his dirty socks, then puts them on. It's actually cute, and la little gross at the same time!

And not just socks, but slippers can't match either! It's sweet that he shares with his sister though. Jackson loves pajama day, and tries everyday to stay in his jammies. 

Brooklyn loves to attack Jackson and just sit on him. Here they are watching a show, probably Mickey Mouse, Brooklyn loves Mickey and will stop everything when she sees or hears him, sad but also cute! Jackson and Brooklyn really are super cute together, until she steals his toy he was playing with! 

Brooklyn stole Jackson's visor and put it on herself. She is super independent, which again is great and frustrating  all at the same time. Her favorite food to feed herself, yogurt. And every time she eats with her fingers and gets covered in it. 

Sports

We decided it was time to get Jackson involved in some structured sports. Our YMCA does an Itty Bitty program where they do a few different sports over eight weeks for younger kids. Jackson has loved it so far and has learned a little about golf, football, soccer and t-ball. It is starting to get too hot to be outside, so he also gets to swim one week. Hopefully  he can decide on one or two sports to keep up with. Overall it's been a good program, but it seems the program is new, so some kinks need to be worked out.

Spring Break-Prescott

We had two weeks off for Spring Break, which was great since Bobby is working in Chicago during the week, so Mikelle and the kids went up to Prescott. They got a few days with Barry's family, and a few days with just Trenton, Kira and Tessa. It was nice for the kids to have playmates, but not the chaos of a whole other family.
We had lots of activities to do, and lots of great food. Grandma made these super yummy chicken burritos, which Brooklyn loved. Loves all food, especially if it comes off of someone else's plate. Stole mommy's burrito and ate most of it! She loves guacamole, eats it plain. Totally takes after her mommy. 

While in Prescott, we got some snow, not enough to matter, but Jackson loved it for a minute then wanted to go inside. We were bummed when it snowed hard core just days after we left. Almost made a trip back just for the day!

Jackson couldn't get enough of the ATV's. Papa just let them ride and ride, but when it was time to get off, Jackson couldn't handle it. Poor boy was running low on sleep for 2 weeks, being spoiled by grandma and papa, and just couldn't take being told no. Biggest fit ever, but at least it wasn't in public! 

We had so much fun at the zoo. It's small, but the animals are so close and there are fun toys to play on. The kids especially loved the insect house, once Tessa was assured all the bugs where in their cages!

We got to watch them feed the bear. It was awesome. He especially loved this ball covered in peanut butter and fruit. Just licked away at it. Look how close we were!

Resting after all the walking around the zoo.

Strutting her stuff for the onlookers, the animals were getting too much attention! Tia bought this dress for Brooklyn, and she loves it! Swishes when she walks, too cute!! Everyone told her so. She was flirting with a little boy and everything.  She may actually be a girly-girl! We are so not prepared for this!

Grandma saw these St. Patrick's Day outfits, and had to have them. The dress was to die for, and Jackson liked the shirt which is so him, so you can't go wrong! Brooklyn added the socks and shoes, but at least the shoes match her hair bow! (And no, we didn't let her out like this)! 

Update

Jackson and Brooklyn love to ride in the bike trailer. Brooklyn loves her helmet, which is opposite of what we thought would happen, but I guess if you start them young...The problem with it is that it is already getting too hot to be outside for too long, so the kids are sad when it is a short ride.

Brooklyn is still putting everything in her mouth, but  at least this is close to food! 

We are working on her bubble blowing, but mostly the wand goes in the mouth. She understands she is supposed to blow, but not that you leave it out of the mouth to blow! 

Our handsome 4 year old. Tries to be a big boy, but still loves his baths, and he mostly plays nice with his sister while in the tub.

Brooklyn loves water in general. We are excited to start swimming again, but we think Jackson is still afraid of the water. It may be a long two weeks of swimming lessons.

Jackson has taken on the bigger bike though. He really didn't want to let go of his big wheels, but is now so excited about his Mater bike. We think the training wheels will stay on for awhile though, he still leans a lot to the left. Brooklyn is hoping we let her ride a bike soon. Always trying to get onto the big wheels, but she's still a little short!