My BFF

When I was born I had some instant friends. They call them cousins, and I had a lot of them. Luckily I was born right in the middle of all of them, some older, some younger. We always gathered at my grandma's and it was always so much fun. To this day we are all still very close. Jaxson is the oldest of his group of cousins that will be someday so doesn't have the instant friends yet. But he has Aubrey. Our very good friends Holcomb and Leah had a daughter just six months, almost exactly, before Jaxson was born. She was the first baby that Dave held. I went to her baby shower and Aubrey and Leah went to mine. On just the second day of being here Jaxson met Aubrey in person. And since they have been the best of friends. They had a rough patch where they didn't play nicely but it lasted only a small amount of time and they were back hand in hand. They will be found reading, playing, or just laughing each time they are together. Jaxson's face lights up when he sees Aubrey's picture and he yells out "Bobby" and starts to laugh right away. If you tell him Aubrey is coming over he runs to the door or climbs to the window. They truly are best friends that will be able to grow up together and have a bond that many people may never share with anyone. Here a few pictures I could find of the two of them. I have ALOT more but it would take me all night to find all of my favorites.

Aubrey and Leah were there for Jaxson's babyshower

Jaxson and Aubrey's first meeting when he was just 1 day old

Aubrey was showing Jaxson how to use his legs

This picture was when Aubs and Jax got together for the Iowa vs. Penn state game in 2008

Jaxson and Aubrey at her second birthday test driving her new car together

The following pictures were taken tonight. When I looked through the pictures I just thought how lucky they are to have such a great friendship at only two years old.

Dancing hand in hand to Yo Gabba Gabba

Alaira Jean Frank

My little sister had her baby today which officially makes Jaxson a cousin. Her name is Alaira Jean and she was born today, May 29th at 12:01am in Wenatchee, Washington. She was 7.1lbs and Michelle was in labor for nearly 24hours. Eeks! Wish I was there to meet her in person.

Dinnertime in the Summertime

Dinnertime in the summertime means eating shirtless and on the deck. Now with our new treeless backyard it also means Jaxson can enjoy a grassy view with plenty of dogs to keep him entertained. Even better, we ordered pizza tonight.

Canon Weekend

I told Dave I would really love at some point (in the near future if possible) get a digital SLR camera. I have wanted one for a long time and have finally got my hands on one... for the weekend anyway. Aunt Sue has a Canon camera that she got a couple years ago and offered to lend it to me for a weekend to "see if I liked it." This was Dave's worst nightmare because if he thought I wanted one before, he should wait to see how bad I want one after having one for three days. As soon as I got home I of course took a few pictures of Jaxson. Luckily for me he was hamming it up for me. I think he could tell I was pretty excited about it.

I know that I will have one someday. Once I do have one Sue and I talked about taking a photography class at Dmacc together and, if offered, one for Photoshop to learn how to make them even better. It is amazing how a simple snap shot taken with a nice camera makes it look nearly professional. Some people do have a special eye for capturing the right moment on any camera but this camera really helps an average picture look a little more special. I am expecting that this weekend will be a fun, family filled weekend with LOTS of pictures to prove it.

Springtime Flowers

Jaxson and I stopped at my dad's this morning to pick up a few things and all the Peony plants in the yard were blooming. I though it was a good opportunity to try to get a springtime flower picture with Jaxson. He didn't exactly smile but he did stand there nicely while I got a few shots.

Mr. FixIt

Dave is a handyman when it comes to most things. Cars are not one of them. He knows how to change tires, change oil, but that doesn't actually mean that he has actually done it ever before. So when my air conditioner broke I never imagined Dave being the one to fix it. We took it to Aamco for a free estimate and they told us it would be a whopping $1000. Luckily it was the end of summer and the heat still worked. Now that it has been hot lately I have noticed my lack of air. He was searching online and found a website with step by step instructions to fix this problem the unconventional but very CHEAP way. When he told me about it I was hestitant. "You wanted to cut a hole into the bottom of my dashboard and do what, are you crazy???" was pretty much my reaction. But because I don't want to throw away money in a car that is nearly 15 years old I told him to go for it. I figured, he can't break what is already broken. Today he brought home the ten dollar part and the 20 page printed directions and went to work. He said it would take him an hour, which mean that it would take considerably longer than that. He isn't very good at estimating how quickly he will fix something. About 4 1/2 hours later he came in looking proud and asked me to come out and turn on the car with him to see if it worked. We brought Jaxson, turned on the car and cranked on the AC. In just a minute we could feel the cool air filling up the car. Aaaahh.... no more 455 style air conditioner anymore. (4 windows down, going 55mph)

I Can't Hear You!!

Jaxson has recently learned to plug his ears. It is funny that he really does do it when he decided to not listen. He originally learned it from being in the car with the windows down and it was loud. And since he does it when I say "time for bed" or "let's change your diaper." This picture was the "time for bed" ear plugging after an evening bath. Although I don't love the idea of him not listening, it is awfully cute.

Spray Away

I did some more weeding today in the garden trying to get out all the mini trees that are sprouting from the millions of helicopter seeds that fell a month ago from the tree above. It will be an ongoing process I have a feeling. Jaxson was playing in the yard and saw the sprayer a mile away and came running. Once he got his hands on it he couldn't get enough and was actually pretty good at it too. I would tell him what plant to water and he would spray it until I told him to move on to the next. He started to play with the water and then was having even more fun. We watered all the plants and he probably will be raring to do it again right away tomorrow morning. Maybe soon I will be able to just send him out to water the garden and I can just watch from the window. And in soon I mean a few years...

Fashionista

Jaxson just couldn't help himself when he saw his Dad's socks sitting there. Maybe this is going to be the new trend for toddlers and Jaxson is just a trend setter.

Water Party in May

The weather man said it would be sunny and warm from Tuesday on this past week. He was about 1/3 right. It was warmER, it was mostly cloudy, and was rainy a few of the days. The only thing they were right about was that this weekend was going to warm up and be humid. Today we got a call from Carol who was headed to Beth's and setting up the slip and slide. It was warm, we were not busy, and figured why not. Kyra brought over an old pair of swim trunks for Jaxson that didn't fit Fischer anymore. We rolled the top over, cinched them up and they were perfect.

All the neighborhood kids were there taking turns. Jaxson wasn't so sure of himself on the slip and slide so he wandered around the yard with a stroller, chased the dogs, watched in awe of the kids flying in every which direction down the slip&slide, then headed straight for the sandbox. The only problem with that was I had just lathered him up with sunscreen. If you didn't already guess he looked like the sand monster after three minutes of romping in the sandbox. I grabbed a few pics, wiped him off, and then we headed home for at least a partial nap. Luckily, when we got home Dave had finished prepping the air conditioner for the summer and cranked her on. Oh, how I love summer... (and it's still Spring so there is a lot more summer to come!)

Compromising My Wish List

Ihave always loved taking pictures and feel some amount of anxiety when I feel I am "missing a moment." Some may find it surprising that I have always been this way and having my little Jaxson has only made it worse. I have also always wished I was better at taking pictures and would love to take a photography class and learn more about it and how to use my photoshop better. Jennie, who started me on blogging (Thank You!) also keeps a blog I check regularly. She has recently got an amazing new digital camera that turns a 'snapshot' into a professional looking, 'hang it on the wall' type of picture. I have also always wanted a digital SLR camera and hopefully someday I will get my hands on one I can call my own. For now I am compromising my wish list. My dad got me a 35mm SLR camera when I graduated high school complete with two lenses. I use to take pictures with it so much until I got so wrapped up into digital, like everyone else, and kind of forgot they still use film. Feeling like I wanted some better pictures after drooling in jealousy from Jennie blog I dusted off my SLR film camera and started taking some pictures. It's been awhile and I could stand to read the manual again but it was still fun. After every picture I snapped I instinctively looked at the back of my camera but of course could not see my picture. What can I say, I have gotten used to instant gratification! When I had them developed I had them put the photos on disk rather than in hard copy for me. I am still unsure on the exact resolution of them when put on disk but from what I can see they look pretty good and will work for anything I will ever want to use them for. So, for the time being we will just be taking photos the "old school" way. Here are some pictures from my first roll of film in many years. I have one more roll I finished today of Jaxson and his cousins on the slip and slide and already itching to take it to Target and see what I have!