Book List: 4-5+

Here is a book list for kids 4-5+. You can introduce these before the age of 5 but some of the content might be too mature for them. Use discretion.

+ Indicates that the book is either a Caldecott Honor or Medal Book

The Ugly Duckling; Emperor’s New Clothes (illustrated by Virginia Lee Burton) - Hans Christian Anderson

A House For a Hermit Crab - Eric Carle

Jack’s Garden - Henry Cole

Mrs. Rumphius - Barbara Cooney

+ St. George and the Dragon - Margaret Hodges

The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore - William Joyce

I Want My Hat Back - Jon Klassen

The Giant Jam Sandwich - John Vernon Lord

Through Grandpa’s Eyes - Patricia MacLachlan

Blueberries for Sal; One Morning in Maine; Lentil - Robert McCloskey

Paperboy - Dav Pilkey

Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak

Amos and Boris; Shreck - William Steig

Morris the Moose - Bernard Wiseman

+ Rapunzel; + Rumpelstiltsken; + Hansel and Gretel - Paul Zelinsky

Through Grandpa’s Eyes - Patricia MacLachlan

Book List: 3-4+

Heres is a book list for ages 3-4+. You can introduce these before age 4 but some of the books will have concepts above their understanding.

+ Indicated the book is a Caldecott Honor or Medal Book

All Things Bright and Beautiful - Cecil Frances Alexander

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs - Judy Barrett

Stone Soup - Marcia Brown

Our Library - Eve Bunting

Mike and the Steam Shovel; The Little House - Virginia Lee Burton

The Mixed-Up Chameleon; Pancakes, Pancakes; Walter, the Baker - Eric Carle

Trucks; Freight Train - Donald Crews

+ Strega Nona - Tomie De Paola

Planting A Rainbow; Eating the Alphabet - Lois Ehlert

The Story of Ping - Marjorie Flack

And Then It Was Spring - Julie Fogliano

A-Z Picture Book; Oh What A Busy Day - Gyo Fujikawa

Owen; Chrysanthemum - Kevin Henkes 

Bedtime for Frances - Russell Hoban

Danny and the Dinosaur - Syd Hoff

The Red Apples - Pat Hutchins

Carrot Seed - Ruth Kraus

The Owl and the Pussycat - Edward Lear 

Mouse Soup; Frog and Toad; Owl at Home; Grasshopper on the Road - Arnold Lobel 

Frog Went A Courtin’ - John Longstaff

All the Places I Love; What You Know First - Patricia MacLachlan

Time of Wonder - Robert McCloskey

Too Much Noise - Ann McGovern 

Roxaboxen - Alice McLerran

Tikki, Tikki, Tembo - Arlene Mosel

Marshmallow - Clare Turlay Newberry

Katy No-Pocket - Emmy Payne

+ Puss in Boots - Charles Perrault, illustrated by Malcolm Arthur

Bee Tree; Thundercake; The Keeping Quilt - Patricia Polacco

+ Baboushka and the Three Kings - Ruth Robbins

Rattle Trap Car - Phyllis Root

In November; The Old Woman Who Named Things - Cynthia Rylant

Swirl By Swirl - Joyce Sidman

+ The House in the Night - Susan Marie Swanson

Balloons Over Broadway - Melissa Sweet

Whoever You Are, My Love Will Find You - Nancy Tillman

Lyle, Lyle Crocodile - Bernard Waber 

The Biggest Bear - Lyn Ward

My First Little House Series - Laura Ingalls Wilder

A Chair For My Mother; Three Days On A River In a Red Canoe - Vera B. Williams

Silly Sally - Audrey Wood

Miss Suzy - Miriam Wood

Harry the Dog - Gene Zion

The Seashore Book; The Storm Book - Charlotte Zolotow

A Book List 2-3+

Here is a book list for ages 2-3+. It is fine to introduce these before age 3 but some of the concepts may not be understood.

+ Indicates a Caldecott Honor or Medal Book

LMNO Peas - Keith Baker

Madeline - Ludwig Bemelmans 

The Mitten - Jan Brett

The Little Island - Margaret Wise Brown

Opposites - Eric Carle

Bear Snores On - Karma Wilson and Jane Chapman

Mrs. Wishy Washy’s Farm and others - Joy Cowley

Dancing Feet; Farmyard Beat - Lindsey Craig

Let the Whole Earth Sing Praise; Haircuts for Woolseys and many more - Tomie De Paola 

Mary I Bring a Friend? Beatrice de Regniers

Time to Sleep; Count - Denise Fleming

Corduroy - Don Freeman 

Ox Cart Man - Donald Hall

A House is a House For Me - Mary Ann Hoberman

Goodnight Owl; The Wind Blew; Rosie’s Walk - Pat Hutchins

+ Snowy Day; Peter’s Chair - Ezra Jack Keats

Ferdinand - Munroe Leaf

Always Room For One More - Sorche Nic Leodhas

Swimmy; Frederick; Alexander and the Wind Up Mouse - Leo Lionni

Chicka, Chicka Boom, Boom; Barn Dance - Bill Martin

+ Make Way for Duckling - Robert McCloskey 

When the Leaf Blew In - Steve Metzger 

Amazing Airplanes; Terrific Trains - Tony Mitton 

The Little Red Hen - Diane Muldrow

Dogteam; Canoe Days - Gary Paulsen

A Year at Maple Hill Farm - Alice and Martin Provensen

Looking for a Mouse - Phyllis Root

Night in the Country; Bunny Bungalow - Cynthia Rylant

Richard Scarry books

Caps for Sale - Esphyr Slobodkina

Dr. De Soto - William Steig

Owl Moon - Jane Yolen

A Book List: 2+

Here is a book list for children 2 years and up. These could also be read to younger babies as well but the 2+ range is when the children will begin to understand the concepts in these books better.

+ indicates a Caldecott Honor or Medal book.

Booklist 2+

Airport; Trains; Planes; Boats and many more - Byron Barton

ABC; Slowly, Slowly, Said the Sloth - Eric Carle

Noah’s Ark; The Maisy Series; Jazzy; Country Animals; Garden Animals - Lucy Cousins

In the Tall, Tall Grass; In the Small Small Pond - Denise Fleming

Kitten’s First Full Moon; Little White Rabbit, My Garden - Kevin Henkes

A Hole is to Dig - Ruth Krauss

Rainstorm; Trainstop - Barbara Lehman (Wordless)

+ Over in the Meadow - John Longstaff

The Little Train; The Little Auto, Policeman Small and many others - Lois Lenski

A Color of His Own; Swimmy - Leo Lionni

Frog Series - Mercer Mayer (Wordless)

The Little Engine that Could - Watty Piper

The Tale of Peter Rabbit and many others - Beatrix Potter

We're Going on a Bear Hunt - Michael Rosen

Dr. Seuss books

+ The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night - Peter Spier

+ A Sick Day for Amos McGee; Bear Has a Story to Tell - Philip Stead

Mouse Paint - Ellen Stoll Walsh 

Wonders of Nature; Prayers for Children; A Day at the Seashore - Eloise Wilkins

A Book List 0-2 Years

Each Peach Pear Plum - Allan Ahlberg

Barnyard Dance!; Pajama Time! and many others- Sandra Boynton
 

Goodnight Moon; Runaway Bunny; Big Red Barn - Margaret Wise Brown

Dear Zoo - Rod Campbell
 

The Very Hungry Caterpillar; The Very Quiet Cricket; The Very Busy Spider; From Head to Toe - Eric Carle 

Jamberry - Bruce Degan

Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You? - P.D. Eastman

Where is the Green Sheep? Mem Fox

In My Den; In My Forest; In My Nest; and other - Sarah Gillingham

123s - Charlie Harper

A Good Day; Old Bear; Little White Rabbit - Kevin Henkes

Beep Beep; Choo Choo and others - Petr Horacek

Counting Kisses and many others- Karen Katz

Pat the Bunny - Dorothy Kunhardt

Let’s Play - Leo Lionni

Brown Bear, Brown Bear - Bill Martin, Jr.

Guess How Much I Love You - Sam McBratney

Mini Masters - Julie Merberg

I Like It When... - Mary Murphy 

Goodnight Gorilla - Peggy Rathman

I Like Fruit; I Like Vegetables; I Like Bugs - Lorena Siminovich

Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You? - Dr. Seuss

I am a Bunny - Richard Scarry

Haiku Baby - Betsy Snyder

We Belong Together - Joyce Wan

Raking Leaves

Last week, I really wanted to get outside! I've been holed up in our house trying to get unfinished projects finished and taking care of Wesley who had a bad stomach bug. The weather has gotten warmer so we took advantage. We raked up a big pile of leaves and Wes had a blast jumping in them. David sat on a blanking cleverly trying to find leaves and grass to eat. Despite all my efforts to keep the leaves and grass out of his mouth, every time I looked at him he had a stem or a blade hanging out of his mouth. One time I pull a full hard crunchy leaf out of his mouth! And happily, he went after another. Finally, he became contented with his toys. Here are some pics of the afternoon.

Pumpkin Pecan Bites

On Pumpkin Day, Wesley and I made these delicious cookies. They were crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside. I think adding chocolate chips would be a good addition too even though they are great without them. 

Pumpkin Pecan Bites

1 stick of butter

1/2 cup sugar (I used 1/3 cup and will probably use even less next time)

1 egg

1/2 cooked pumpkin

1/2 teaspoon vanilla (I used 1 tsp - this makes the cookie sweeter when you take away some of the sugar)

1 cup all purpose flour (I used 1/2 cup whole wheat flour and 1/2 regular)

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon (I used a little more)

1/4 tsp cloves

1/2 cup chopped pecans

Preheat Oven to 375F. Cream the butter and sugar together in a mixer. Add the egg, pumpkin, and vanilla. Sift the dry ingredients together (except for the nuts) and add to the mixer and stir. Mix in the nuts. Drop by heaping tablespoons onto a greased cookie sheet. Bake for about 15 minutes, or until lightly browned. Makes about 30 cookies.

Taken from “The Kid’s Nature Book: 365 Indoor/Outdoor Activities and Experiences” by Susan Milord. 

Pumpkin Day

This year, I decided to call Halloween Pumpkin Day. We don't really like all the scary stuff and Wes and David certainly don't but, I love all things pumpkin so we made it a day of pumpkins. Here is what Wes and I did while Papa was hard at work.

We've just introduced him to glue and he loves it! So I came up with lots of pasting activities. Wes colored paper pumpkin parts and then pasted them onto paper. Then, he sorted out big and little paper pumpkins and glued them in the appropriate box. Then he had to match up pumpkins and glue them in the matching box. Lastly, though not a glueing activity, he traced lines from the family to the pumpkin patch and did very well, on the first one at least. After that, the trace got worse and worse. Something to note later. Too much of something doesn't always mean better. He also colored the letter P and different things that start with P.

After that we read 4 library books about pumpkins. Our favorite was called Pumpkin Cat about a black cat and a mouse trying to grow a pumpkin. 

Then we moved into the kitchen. We placed our real pumpkin on the floor and sang "Ring around the Pumpkin, pocket full of seed, leaves, leaves, we all fall down" sung to the Ring around the Rosie song. Then we marched around, hopped around and stomped around. Again, I found that too much of something doesn't always mean better. Very surprisingly, Wes got tired of hopping and marching around the pumpkin! 

Next, we carved the pumpkin into a kitty cat face inspired by the Pumpkin Cat book. Sadly the pictures I took with Wesley in them didn't come out good. 

Then, we took the scooped out seeds and roasted them in the oven with a little olive oil, salt and pepper at 350 until they started turning a little brown. Yummy!

Lastly, we made Pumpkin Pecan Bites (Cookies) from a recipe I found in The Kid's Nature Book I found at a homeschool book sale for $1. :) They were delicious! They were crunchy on the outside, at least for a while, and soft on the inside. 

Later in the day we went to our church's neighborhood fall festival. Wes had a great time! We kind of lost track of all the candy he was eating which is a bad thing because he never eats any. We paid for it later, especially since it was the first day of really feeling better after a week long stomach bug. He lost all of it and then some. Yuck! We felt terrible. 

David didn't really know what was going on but just smiled at everyone. 

I guess this is a Tigger the Tiger costume. It fits his personality. He's happy and bouncy. Usually when he's sitting up at the table in his high chair he just happily bounces and smiles at us. 

It was a great day! I hope next year to invite a few people over and do much the same thing - celebrating Pumpkin Day with lots of fun crafts and baking. I would have done it this year but I thought up the idea literally the night before! 

This is our friend Jamie (sorry her face is so blurred!) holding David and his friend Logan the Lion at the Fall Festival. Logan is just 4 weeks older than David. 

Octopus Arms

Sorry for the fuzziness of some of these pictures. I'm not the best at photography with any camera and especially bad with my phone! I've tried to start using my real camera again, so hopefully those look a little better.

Well, I've finally decided to sit down and write another post! Things have been busy around here due to several things going on and because I've been trying to do way too many projects at the same time - more on that later. I'll write a post on all the stuff we've been up to soon.

Happy Boy!

But before I do that I wanted to update you on David. He is SO BIG! He's wearing all 12 month clothes now and isn't even 9 months old yet! I call him "Moose." He's a cute moose though. He's got great big cheeks to go with his great big smile. He's happy pretty much all the time except when he's hungry and overtired and when big brother wallops him. (Big brother is mostly sweet to him though!)

David has also enjoyed the exersaucer. We have it set at the highest setting already!

So what is he doing these days?

*He can sit up on his own, which he started doing at 7 months or a bit later.

See my sitting up skills... and my new outfit for my uncle Nathan's wedding! (More on this later)

*He's cutting teeth. He has two on the bottom which he got almost 7 months while on the plane to Georgia. Thankfully, Grandma was with us. Now he's cutting his top teeth.

With Grandma Harrah on the plane. He was so fussy the whole time, very much unlike him. The next day we saw that he had two bottom teeth that he hadn't had a couple of days before! No wonder!

* He sleeps, a lot, still. He takes a morning nap (about 1.5 -2 hrs) and an afternoon nap (2+ hrs) and he goes to bed between 6 and 6:30 at night and sleeps 12.5-13+ hours! No kidding!

* He likes to suck on things - anything ribbonish. You can hear him across the house sucking away on whatever is in his mouth.

When I'm sleepy or hungry, I suck my thumb. When we put him down to sleep, he starts sucking his thumb and grabs up his blanket and nuzzles it and rubs and rolls his eyes like this is the most blissful thing ever.

* His favorite toys right now are my sewing tape measure, a piece of wooden train track (which is sometimes what causes big brother to wallop him!), a pink fabric doll with braids that I bought for the nursery at our church that has yet to make it there (he loves to hold it by her braids and giggle), a set of plastic play measuring spoons, and his mobile. He also likes Wes's big building blocks, but brother doesn't like that too much either.

Chewing on the tape measure. He can no longer sit in this Bumbo on the table because he can reach everything in it and he sits up too tall in it anyway. We just put him in the high chair.

* He's not making too much effort to crawl. If he falls over, he just fusses. If he wants something, he might try to reach for it for a while and may even wind up face down on the floor with his rump in the air and his chubby leg stuck under him. This does not make him happy.

* Some other fun things he likes to do are bounce up and down and see if you will do it too. He also like to shake his head and see if you will copy. He also likes to say "Mum, mum, mum, mum." At the table he just reaches for anything in sight. This is where he gets the nickname "Octopus Arms." He has a far great reach than Wesley did and this has taken some getting used to. He also likes to stroke long hair. He usually doesn't pull it though, which is nice.

His octopus arms are at rest here.

* He's also eating his fair share of solid food. He doesn't like to be left out at meal time! I made lots of homemade purees but unfortunately he likes the canned stuff better. ??? I just eat what he doesn't. The butternut squash is especially good! I don't know why he doesn't like it. I guess we'll have to stick to jars.

Though I like solid food, I still love my bottle! Look at my belly! And look at all those rolls! My legs are even rollier!

I'm hungry!

Sweet little bear.

Happy as a clam!

Who do you think he looks like? We've decided that David has a great mix of a lot of people on both sides of his family, but he definitely favors my dad the most. He even has some of the same expressions!

Playground Olympics

There is a point to all this eventually, so keep reading. I'm wordy and like giving background info. :)

I am so inspired by the Olympics! Part of me wishes I had pursued some sport a little more than I did, which was not at all, in my growing up years. I'm not much for team sports or even watching that much but I love individual sports. I think I might have enjoyed and maybe even been good at either swimming, track or gymnastics though not of Olympic caliber of course! Some of the other individual sports I like to watch are diving, syncronized swimming, figure skating, snow skiing, ski jumping and snowboarding. One team sport I enjoy is bobsledding.

So back to being inspired. I've been working really hard this summer to get the bed rest/pregnancy weight off that seems to cling to me like a 2 year old. :) I thought I was doing so well. I could get into more and more of my pants and looked much thinner. I'd been walking about 2 miles with my boys (around 60+ lbs with stroller) 3-4 times a week purposely hitting the hills around here, and unlike Oklahoma, there are some doozies around our neighborhood! Plus my sister had shown me some stretches/exercises that I tried from time to time. However, I was greatly disappointed when I went for my well-woman exam! How could it be that with all that hard work I'd barely lost 7 lbs since my post partum exam?? So, now I'm more instpired.

Also, Eric is going to hike a 14,000 ft mountain in Colorado over Labor day weekend while I'm basking in the rays on the beach with my sister and the rest of the family. :) He's been training for that doing stairs, going for runs and bike rides. So I want to do more of the same.

However, I am finding it more and more difficult even to get the walks in. David sleeps so much!! I am a nap nazi so I don't want to sacrifice his naps for my exercise. Plus, since the weather has been somewhat cooler (95 instead of 105!), I've been walking straight to the school playground in the mornings and letting Wes slide and swing a lot before school starts when we wont be able to use the playground anymore. So my walks are a lot shorter.

So how can I maximize my time and use the inspiration from the Olympics, my hubby and my lack of weight loss? It has been coming to me slowly over the last few days. Stay with me! As I said, this does have a point!

I was in Costco the other day and saw a cook book designed for Paleo diets which I had only vaguely knew about. I came home and googled about it because some of there recipes sounded good. While perusing, one sight had a link to a type of fitness method and business called Crossfit. We just so happen to know someone who has opened a Crossfit gym in Oklahoma. So I knew a little about that. It uses medicine balls, running, squats, pulls up, rings, rope climbing, gymnastics, jump roping, handstands, etc. with lots of variation. (This is a very bad summary!) I like it because it does have so much variation. I googled the links they had and googled some more because I obviously don't have the time to fit in a gym membership! I found lots of Crossfit-like exercises that I can do at home with no weights. Then I googled Calisthenics and came up with lots of good stuff. I wrote down a list of things I could do late last night.

So while I was at the playground with Wes today it came to me. Why don't I do these exercises while I'm out here with Wes. For instance, pull-ups. I don't have a place in my house to do those so I tried to do them on the monkey bars. Ha! In one of the 50 free Crossfit routines that I found, one of the options was something like 50 pull-ups, 50 sit-ups, 50 push-ups, 3 times! Well, I couldn't even do one pull up! How sad! So I decided just to cross the monkey bars. That was hard too but I managed to do it 3 times! I think I could have done more but my hands were rubbing blisters. Then I just tried climbing on the various climbing things on the playground, like up the sliding pole. Then I did some swinging which can really be a leg and arm workout if you do it long enough. However, since I've had David my stomach gets queasy if I swing to hard and high. Then I did some jumping jacks. I strapped the boys in and tried to sprint (while pushing the stroller) for a little ways. Then I did it again, two more times. When I got home I did some ab exercises, attempted some somersaults and I wanted to do some push-ups but David wanted his bottle more. I had a great time!

It gave me the idea that I can do this all the time wherever I am, in the backyard, at the playground, on vacation, etc and most I can do in the house during winter. So I made a list of a lot of exercises that appealed to me below. Maybe I'll see you on the playground! :)

Calisthenics 

Push ups 

Dips

Pull ups

Arm circles

Crunches

Bridge

Front plank

V sit

Hula hoop

Leg lifts

Sprints

Jumping

Elevated jumping

Squats

Squat jump

Split squat jump

Calf raises

Stairs

Upside down bicycle

Cycling

Swimming

Lunges

Jumping jacks

Hand stands

Somersaults

Jump rope

Back extension 

Wessie

Wow! There is so much to say about Wes. He's doing SO much!

He's talking up a storm! He is starting to put lengthy sentences together. Other people may not understand what he's saying but I can generally pick up what he's saying if there is some context for it. He says words that I didn't know he'd even heard of! He has good grammar and sentence structure and tries to really say a word correctly by looking at your mouth when you say it.

We are in the thick of potty training with him. Finally, I feel up to doing it and it's hot outside and we don't have anything else really going on. It has been a long haul; we are going on three weeks of trying. He does go in the big potty sometimes but he still has lots of accidents. We had a breakthrough tonight because he asked to go to the potty and he actually went! He's never asked to go before! Hurray!

Teaching a bear how to "go potty." This is what Mommy does when Wes is on the potty. Sit on the stool and read stories to him. 

Also, he learned several weeks ago how to climb out of his crib. So now he's sleeping in a twin bed with a rail. Since then his sleep has greatly suffered because he doesn't want to stay in the bed! Mamma and Papa and Baby Brother's sleep has all suffered as well! We've tried EVERYTHING to get him to go to sleep and stay in the bed. He does now go to sleep in the bed instead of on the floor  or under the bed which is a huge improvement but it still takes him a while to do it and he wakes up much earlier than when he was in the crib.

When he first started climbing out of his crib, naps were tough to get him to take. This was after such an attempt.  We was VERY hard to wake up! Thankfully his naps are much better now.

He is also learning lots of other big boy stuff. He can put his uneaten food in the trash and then puts his dishes in the dishwasher, all by himself! He helps to unload the dishwasher and does a great job and just loves to do it. He loves to help with anything! He loves to help Mama cook and bake by adding ingredients and stirring and tasting. This is one of Mamma and Wesley's favorite activities together. He tries to sweep but that gets kind of messy. He's good at cleaning up his own messes too and helping wipe the table after breakfast. He still loves vacuuming too and gets quite upset if I don't let him help in some way. He also helps Mamma water the flowers which sometimes turns into just spraying the hose all over himself. He can put his clothes in the laundry basket and he helps me do the laundry, transferring clothes from the washer to the dryer, from the basket to the washer or the dryer to the basket.

Wes likes to try on our shoes and to put our shoes on us. 

Wes also really enjoys coloring with markers. We are going to go broke keeping enough clean paper around for him! He just colors page after page after page. And he LOVES stickers! For some reason he finds it fascinating and hilarious to put stickers on our lips and pile them on top of each other all around our mouth or between our eyes. He decorated Mogley with stickers today.

Outside he likes to pile rocks up and transfer them from one pile to another or throw them in buckets of water. He also likes to throw the dirt around in Mamma's vegetable garden and eat Mamma's unripe tomatoes when I'm not looking!!!! Ahhh!!! He's picked them clean! I'm a hopeless tomato grower. One year it was Mogley who ate them. Last year a huge tomato worm cleaned out my plant overnight and this year Wesley has done the job. At least he can't pick the zucchini! He does like to help me in the garden though and tries not to step on the flowers.

Yes, he threw a piece of a log in his pool then wanted to drive through his pool with his big wheel. 

Wes is a fish!!! He really loves the water and swimming. He's only been swimming 3 or 4 times this summer in a big pool but he just loves it! This past Sunday he was putting his head under the water and jumping off the side of the pool and purposely wanting to go under water when he did! He was also trying to actually swim by kicking his legs and paddling with his arms. I'm so glad he's not afraid of the water because we love it too!

Going down the slide at the pool. 

He's still just as friendly as ever! He still says hi to everyone he sees, stranger or not.

He's been learning some things at church called a toddler catechism. So the first question is "Who made you?" Answer: "God made you." The next question is "What else did God make?" Answer: "Everything." There are about 6 or 7 questions they've been learning throughout this summer about God and the Bible and Jesus. Wesley's answer to every question is Jesus. The other day I asked him how old he is and he said "Jesus." I was also trying to teach him to say his name when someone asks him, "What is your name?" Every time I asked him his reply was, "Jesus!" I'm not sure where he got this from but I guess it's not a bad thing that his answer for everything is Jesus! :)

He still really enjoys music as well. He asks me to play music and wants me to sing songs to him, especially ones with some kind of movement. He's starting to learn to sing along to some of them and will spontaneously start singing one song in particular called Hot Cross Buns. It's one of the songs on one of his children's cds. He also likes to sing "Turn Your Eyes Upon Jesus." Mamma's sings this to him at nap time every day. We just recently acquired a piano and Wes enjoys "playing" it. It seems like he's really seen someone playing before because he plays it likes he's imitating a professional. It is quite funny.

One way to describe Wes is "physical." He is a constant machine in motion and everything he does has some kind of physical element to it - jumping, running, spinning, climbing, rolling, riding, pushing, pulling, throwing, wrestling, tickling, hugging, kissing and generally just flitting about. It can be very tiring but it is fun to watch.

Well, that is all for now. Hope you've enjoyed this tour through Wessie's life. (Wessie is Mamma's nickname for him.) Enjoy the rest of the pics.

Enjoying a snack after a hard swim.

He loves strawberries!

Chilling out while Mommy and Papa rearrange the house to find room for the piano. (Sorry it's fuzzy!)

Both our boys napping on the stroller ride. David woke up and was cooing and cackling but Wes kept right on snoozing, didn't budge a bit.