a new ride, and a 3 month old

it's been a few years since i've been able to off-road so we traded in my mountain bike for a more family-ride-ready hybrid bike. i'm still trying to get used to the crank-style gear shifts.



i'm not sure if it comes through in pictures - but little andrew has quite the personality! he loves to talk, more than just about anything else, being sung to is a close second. here he is, on his 3-month birthday (june 12th):




unofficial stats at 3 months are:
26" long
16#
wow! he jumped from 79th percentile last month, to 95th this month. he's been wearing some 6-9 month outfits - i could probably pack away the 3-6 month clothes, but i can't quite bear to do that just yet.

his eyes are almost entirely brown now. he's losing hair - in fact, we both are! we both started losing last week. andrew has several large patches that are now entirely gone, although there is some very short, fine hair growing in it's place. i am constantly picking hair off his face, out of his fingers, and off myself. i don't remember evyn having so much hair loss.... or me, either! my shedding is called telogen effluvium, and is related to a post-partum shift in estrogen levels.

for the last two weeks, if you hold his hands when he is sitting, he will push himself up into a standing position. he's not crazy about sitting, he's much happier on his feet. when he is laying on his back he will try like crazy to sit up, but all he manages to do is pick his head up, and work himself into a sweat. he's shown zero interest in trying to roll over, though.







just for fun, here are a few shots of evyn at the same age (shorter, chubbier, and with a lot more hair):

little critters

scott caught this smile on camera last week







evyn spotted this groundhog a few days ago. we had a few good laughs at his expense - this not-so-bright guy must have forgotten how he got into our yard, because he couldn't find a way out. he paced the fenceline for half an hour before finding a spot to escape through.

who needs the zoo?

our big plan for this week was to spend a day at the zoo, but the weather just didn't cooperate with us.

instead, we dodged the raindrops and went to penn cinemas to see up, the disney pixar movie - in 3D. andrew slept through all but the very beginning, while we munched on buttery popcorn and junior mints (mmmmm).



we had our own little wildlife show here at home!

a blue jay hatchling fell from the nest and spent three days in our yard before figuring out how to work his wings.

what was so interesting was watching the mom and dad jay (a bird which i usually am not fond of), watching over him the whole time. i got to see them chasing the neighbor's feral cats out of the yard - what a riot! big, hungry cats running like the wind from an angry bird.






yet another unsuccessful attempt at capturing andrew's smile... he looks like a little wild child, doesn't he?

wrapping up the month of May

so here we are. it's june 5th. and i'm still sorting out pictures from may. well, ok, let's get started!


i've been trying for weeks to catch andrew's sweet smile on film...er, pixels, that is. no such luck! but evyn did capture this squeal/smile combo:





evyn was bummed that we weren't feeling up to dragging out and blowing up her pool. so, i gave her a plastic bin, some blue food coloring, and told her it was the ocean for her polly pockets to play in. kept her busy the whole afternoon!



every summer evyn has liked to chase behind me as i mow the lawn. three years ago i started mowing lines - which means skipping every other pass with the mower. i'll leave them up for a few hours and we'll race back & forth through the grassy valleys. (scott hates when i do this.... why do men take mowing so seriously???)

this time i thought i'd have a little fun and mow one continuous path through the front yard. i circled 'round the outside, spiraling inward and ending at the crabapple tree in the middle. then i shut off the mower, and we followed the green grass road!

it really looked much cooler in person.

it was surprisingly quite a long path. we trekked it three times before cooling off with popsicles, then mowing it flat.






the peas that scott & evyn planted in march are producing nicely. evyn likes to pick & eat them right in the garden :)
(sorry for the bad picture quality)