let's play outside

Graham really likes to play in the dirt.  He thought he'd share with Mason.  Mason just sat quietly while Graham put handfuls and handfuls of dirt all over him and the stroller.

graduation party

The end of medical school is so close it's becoming quite frightening.  I don't know how we made it this far so quickly...it seems like we just got here.  But to celebrate being nearly done with school, we took a trip to San Diego with our best Midwestern friends and lived it up for a few days.  : )  Special thanks to Troy and Brooke Bushman, Johnny and Megan Tefteller, and Sam and Heather Ashby.  We had a lot of fun!

it's easier if you take the sprinkler off, buddy...

...but probably not as cute.

sleep {aka 'eep'}

Who would have thought that little babies don't just know how to sleep?  Strange, it is.  : )  Not really, but it's been interesting learning how to help our boys sleep.  When Graham was four months, he was ready for some sleep training, and he caught on to falling asleep unassisted in one try.  It was quick, easy, and painless.  He did really well for a while, with only a few set-backs here and there.  Most recently, though, Graham has made a game of getting out of his toddler bed.  At night, we'd put him down, and he'd get up.  Multiple times.  And this would go on for a few hours, sometimes until 10.  We tried all the tricks, but he thought he was so funny.  So we had to implement some bed time rules.  I'll let Graham tell you about them.

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baseball

It's spring training time around here and the weather last weekend was b-eautiful.  We headed to the ball park with the Bushmans, and we had lots of fun!

Mason needed to stay hydrated. 

Gotta sport the Padres hat, even though they weren't playing...

We tried to get Graham to stay by us and sit or relax or watch the game, but he wanted to just run.  And run he did.

Graham and Jackson watched some of the game.

Stop it.  Look how cute.

Mason and Miss Clara spent some time conversing.  Don't you love her hat?  Very stylish.  : )

Hey boys.

blog malfunction *update

After playing with this silly thing for hours...I just changed the template.  So sad.  Now you can't see the pictures of our cute boys all the time on the side...they're hidden in that silly gray bar on the right side... Oh well.  Maybe someday the old template I was using will work again.  I better do something a little more productive with my time rather than playing with the settings on the blog for hours...like picking up laundry...  : )

Does anybody know why our blog is looking like this?  What is this ^ line? All my links are way down below and don't work.  I've been playing with it for two days now and I can't seem to fix it.  Any ideas?  I've tried everything I know how to do...  : (

bowling

Last weekend we went bowling with some friends of ours and Graham had a blast.  He was way excited to push the ball down the little ramp and knock pins over.  He was hard to keep from taking over everyone's turn.

Don't let Graham's small size fool you.  He was picking up 15 pound balls like it was no one's business.  He'd lift the ball from the ball return place and start heading for the ramp.

Mason was a sport and played with his toys while we bowled.

Cute boys

happy half birthday, Mason!

Our little "Bobby" is 6 months old!  We can hardly believe that he's 6 months old already...it's gone by really fast.  {He's acquired the nickname "Bobby" from Graham...Graham calls Mason Bobby.  We're not sure why, he just did right from the get-go.  I'm not big on nicknames, but Bobby is a pretty good pet name.}

But at 6 months old, Mason is...

19.1 lbs!   (He's the size Graham was at 9 months.)

27.5 inches tall!

And as cute as they come.

In a word: Mason likes food.  He was born hungry.  Just minutes after he was born, he was looking for food.  It was so funny.  He wiggled his teeny little body because he knew food was close by and he was going to get there.  Now he's discovered that there's even better food and he's crazy about it.  Never for one second did he gag or question baby food or rice cereal, he knew he wanted it long before he even saw it.  When we try to feed him with a spoon, he grabs the spoon with excitement and pulls it to his mouth.  He isn't very gentle, either.  He's pretty strong and it's hard to get the spoon away from him.

Mason loves to be where the action is.  If it's quiet or nothings going on, he'll let us know that he's not having fun.  He loves to watch Graham and Matt play around, and really wants to get in on the action.  

As you can see, this boy loves a bath.  

And somehow, he knows that sippy cups are awesome.  This one just so happens to be Grahams, not Masons, but Mason likes to drink out of any cup we let him.  If we are holding him and try to get a drink of water he freaks out, and grabs for our cups.  

We've figured out a way to have dinner in peace.  We used to try and put Mason in his swing or the bumbo while we ate, and it was a no-go.  He hated it.  Mostly because he didn't think it was fair that we were eating and he was not.  So I got some of these funny little baby feeders, it's basically a mesh pouch with a big handle.  We put banana in it and Mason thinks its the greatest thing.  He sucks the banana through the mesh and quietly eats away while we eat our dinner.

All-in-all, Mason's about as cute as they come.  He's such a sweetheart, and loves to be held.  He gets really excited when you walk up to him, and really upset when you pass him or walk right by.  He's awfully fun and we sure love him.