New favs

Graham has really developed a love of cars over the last week or so. He jabbers about them and gets really excited when he sees one in person, a toy, on TV, etc. He loves to say "Go car!" I guess that is his first sentence.

He has also been watching movies on his portable DVD player while in his crib. He really likes The Fox and the Hound. Mommy and Daddy were cleaning the house and he stood there and watched the entire movie.


Graham was pretty excited to wear his smocked tractor outfit today. Mommy loves it too!

Franks Father's Day

The Franks celebrated Father's Day a week late at our house yesterday. The big event of the evening was really finding out whether Graham was getting a boy cousin or a girl cousin. However, we had to wait all the way until dessert to find out! Aunt Ginny made a gender reveal cake. While we were waiting on dinner to finish cooking, we opened Father's Day gifts and it came a horrible storm with lots of hail. For a little while we thought there may actually be a Franks girl on the way! But when Granddaddy finally cut the cake, it was BLUE! We are so excited and can't wait to meet Colin Elijah. The age difference between Graham and Colin will almost be exactly the same as the age difference between Daddy and Uncle Jared. According to Grandmother, they were "rounders." Uh oh, Aunt Ginny!

First Swimming Lesson

Graham seemed better today so we chanced going to his first swimming lesson. The pool was 1 foot deep and warm and at first he seemed to love it. He really liked singing songs and splashing in the water. Then the teacher gave them noodles to push like grocery carts. Graham became obsessed with it and drug it all over the pool (never pushing it like a grocery cart) even when it was time to move onto something else. If there had been an award for most times under water, he would have won it. Fortunately, he still has the baby memory of holding his breath and never once coughed or choked. He got pretty fussy if Mommy tried to get him to do something besides drag the noodle around. Oh well...maybe it will get better. A child should be able to swim by age 8 so I have a feeling we have years of lessons ahead of us!

To a great Daddy...

Well, unfortunately Daddy has had a very yucky Father's Day weekend. Graham had a fever on Friday a light touch of a stomach bug. We thought we were in the clear and headed out to lunch on Saturday when there was a huge "incident." Needless to say, we never made it to lunch. Graham's illness just got worse and Daddy took really good care of him. We didn't even get to visit Papa today as planned. (The Franks are celebrating next weekend.) Graham is a little better, but still not 100%. Needless to say, we have no cute Father's Day pictures.

Thanks for being such a great Daddy, Brian. We love you!

Happy Flag Day!

Graham wore this cute outfit to church this past Sunday in honor of Flag Day. Mommy has always loved smocked flags and had a hard time justifying it, but it was on sale and he can probably still wear it in November with a shirt for Veteran's Day. Hey - we have to get the good out of it! When are the next Olympics? =)





This is what he wore to daycare today. He came home in such a loving mood and kept giving us hugs. He has been much more pleasant during the past week.

Growing into Toys

These pictures were taken during the last few weeks. Graham is finally growing into toys that he got for Christmas and enjoying playing with them.

He still loves his books. In some of these pictures you can see why I do not like the book shelf sometimes! Also, if someone is not reading a book to him, he reads it to himself by jabbering away while he looks at the pages.





Cousin E was in town a few weeks ago. Graham has always loved his car. Even if no one is pushing him, he loves to sit in it and pretend he is driving. And for some reason, he kept getting on his tractor backwards.



In the last couple of weeks he has finally started paying more attention to his rocky horse. He can now make it rock and bounce. I think his legs just got long enough for it and his tractor!


In other news, Mommy saw him eating cheerios at school today...with a spoon! Very impressive. He also said his teacher's name today for the first time (Selma).

Also, a correction to my last post. Graham went to a non-family birthday party last year when O turned 4 so technically it was not his first social appearance. However, he wasn't even crawling then so I forgot about it!

Super Party

Graham made his first social appearance today at Ruby's birthday party. She was turning 4 and the theme was Super Heros. Now, for as long as Mommy has known Ruby's mommy (11 years), she has always thrown the best parties. This event was no exception. There were about 20 kids and she made capes for all of them and had thoroughly planned out the Super Hero theme. All of the kids were at Super Hero Academy and had to go through an obstacle course to earn their capes. (We had to wake Graham up from a nap to go to the party so he wouldn't try the obstacle course and was shy most of the party.) After that there was even a villain (Ruby's daddy), Dr. H2O who turned on the sprinklers and threw out kryptonite for kids to collect without touching it. After defeating Dr. H2O with their web slingers (silly string) the kids took on his super power and all got water bottles. This was Graham's favorite part by far. He had fun spraying himself in the face. Daddy let him eat a few bites of ice cream. The sugar really perked him up and he was more curious about the obstacle course. Fortunately, it was time to go by then. (Fortunate because Graham would have been scaling tall buildings for real due to his sugar rush.) Thanks, Ruby, for inviting us to a great party!

Red, White, and Blue

Graham has many red, white, and blue outfits for summer and Mommy has had fun taking his picture in all of them. There's also some bonus pictures of him wearing Daddy's shoes and "helping" Mommy with laundry.

16 Months

Graham turned 16 months yesterday. He's definitely a toddler now! We should probably go ahead and get a copy of Strong Willed Child. He has so many new words. "Doot Doot" for "Thank You", car, "shew" for shoe (sounds like "shew! That stinks!" but is an improvement over "Za"), and I am sure I am forgetting some others. We're surprised when a new one randomly pops up.

He has also been learning his body parts at school. He can say "nose", but can point to his tummy, foot, knee, mouth, etc. when asked where they are.

Today, he has started wiping his own nose. He pitched a fit when Mommy did it, but a few minutes later took out a wipe and started wiping his own nose. Tonight he is wiping his own nose when asked. Gotta love that! The down side is that he constantly wants another wipe.

Also, he has started trying to put on Mommy and Daddy's shoes. He has always picked them up and played with them, but this is the first time he's tried to put them on and walk around. Now he does it all the time.