The Grandparents Came To Town

This past week Preston's parents came to visit...Paxton. We had a grand ole time. Paxton really enjoyed the full time attention.

For our anniversary Preston's parents sent us out on a date and while we were gone assembled a wheelbarrow for us. Pax had a fun time "helping". He is really into standing up now so this picture was captured right before his escape attempt.
Pax had lots of time to bond with Grandma. She fed him almost every meal while she was here but I didn't snap a picture of that. I must have been too busy enjoying my time not feeding him.
Here is how we like to enjoy our wheelbarrow best. I suppose at some point we will get some work done with it.
Pax loved playing with Grandpa. He had a whole repertoire of new games, faces and sounds for Pax to enjoy.
While the Granparents were in town we went to a pancake and pea pick at a farm not too far from Marshfield. They are an organic farm run by a young family. The pancakes were delicious and we got to pick peas, raspberries and strawberries. Pax also tried his first taste of homemade applesauce. He was a fan! Pax had a good time at the farm but was exhausted and very hot by the time we took this pic.
Now it is life back to normal....We are missing you Grandma and Grandpa!

Anniversary get away

We celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary together in Madison. For the first time we celebrated our anniversary on the actual day. we had a romantic get-away with Pax at the concourse hotel (thanks North Ridge Church)!

here is a video of Pax having a great time at the zoo Carousel


This picture we snapped last night after his 11pm feeding. when Aim laid him back in his crib he just stretched out and ended up with his arms like this. It's safe to say he was very relaxed!

scooting & standing up

Getting good video of Pax is becoming more of a challenge. He seems to know when we get the camera out to film and so we have to hide it or sneak it out most of the time. Our latest vids are of him scooting across the room and pulling himself up on the cupboard. The scooting (army crawling) only happens when he is really motivated. His motivation comes usually in the form of irresistible technology.


* Please excuse the laundry. We don't live like slobs. We were in the middle of folding it when we took this video. :)

This Sums Up Our Life

We spent Memorial Day with a bunch of friends on a farm, helping them plant their garden and then sharing in a huge potluck feast. It was a great day, with great weather. A friend shot this picture. In my opinion, this picture sums up our lives right now. Baby drool on the shoulder, dirty baby hands in our faces, snotty kid in arms...but still we can't help smiling.

It's been too long

Well once again it has been too long since I have written last. We have had a couple of exciting events take place since the last time I have written.

The picture above is of a dinner we had the other night with some friends. It has a bit of a special place in my heart because these newfound friends are natives to Uganda and hope to return there soon after finishing Residency at the Clinic. Our good friend Carrie introduced us. It was such a special treat for me to talk with Ugandan's (I spent a month there in college.) as I have had very little connection to my experiences in Uganda since returning. On a side note, Pax broke his first dish at this dinner. Go figure it was at someone elses home and not our dish. I had him on my lap and was just about to dig into a creamy homemade custard and raspberry sauce dish when he reached out and flung the dish across the table and onto the floor. Awesome :)
For Mother's Day and Preston's Birthday we took a few hours away from home and Pax, and checked out a local park we had never been to before. The picture above just cracks me up because you know you live in WI when you snap a picture and there are cows in the background. Ironically we went to a park, even without our child. But that's what Pres and I enjoy doing. It was fun to act like kids again and take a momentary break from the parent role. We biked, walked, see- sawed, swung, and found our next camping spot.
Pax is slowly graduating to solids. He eats cereal regularly now and has tried avacados and bananas. He really likes to be a helper when eating. I try to get a few solid bites in without his help and then just let him "help" as much as he can. That is why he ends up looking like this.

Here is us at the park.
For Preston's Birthday Pax got Preston an iPad. Pax seems to be as enamored with it as his Daddy. His favorite things to do with it is watch it with his mouth hanging open, drool on it, and bang on it.

Pax has also cut his first tooth and is sitting up on his own. I will try and get a picture of both of these milestones soon.

I'm Such a Sap

If you have followed our blog from the beginning you will recall the antique dresser that Preston and I refinished for Paxton while I was pregnant. We use it as our staging area for changing him. Well today he "discovered" the dresser. While getting dressed, changing, and playing in his room, he has never before really noticed the dresser. I was dressing him on the floor today and as I stood him up his eyes locked on the dresser and he squealed. He continued to just stare at it with a big smile, taking it all in. I put him up to it and let him hold onto the handles with one hand as he took his other hand and ran it back and forth over the cracks, cooing in delight. You would have thought he was once blind and this was the first thing he saw after regaining his sight. I am not really sure what was going through his little head but it was precious. I got all teary eyed. He was actually enjoying the one thing we both worked hard on to make for him in preparation for his birth. I got to tell him that we made it for him. (I am not so delusional as to think he understood that, but I still liked telling him.)
Anyhoo, it was a precious little moment that was unexpected.
On a side note, I noticed today that allowing him to grasp the knobby handles is great fine motor practice for rock climbing. Even reached for the higher knobs as he got a good hold on the ones eye level to him. We may have a rock climbing prodigy...

Racing Family

Pax competed in his first race this past Saturday. Well, to be fair he was around for a Duathalon that Aim and I did together as a team. (However, he wants me to tell you that he did cross the finish line first, beating both mom and dad, more on that later).
We decided to register as a mixed team for the Woodson YMCA Duathalon (click to see results) as a way to get ourselves into shape. Nothing like a goal of being able to be competitive on a 5K run- 32K bike - 3K run race course to motivate both of us to work out and get into shape after having a baby and going through winter!
Needless to say, we didn't do that best at training. I only biked once before the race (and only 16 miles) so I was a bit nervous at how my legs would hold up. Aim ran a bit more than I but not as much as she had hoped and never 8K in a day. So with Pax in his jogging stroller and our running shoes and bike all tuned up we set out on this adventurous course.
Aim was up first and ran a 24:27 (7:53/mile pace, very good for her). Then Preston took off on the 20 mile bike finishing the windy course in 1:05 (averaging about 18mph). After the bike Preston tagged Aimee who took off on the 3K run. Pax and Preston joined her halfway through and finished the run as a family (this is where Pax got the most cheers and crossed the finish line ahead of us because the stroller was in front of us both!).
The biggest surprise came after the race when we looked at the results as saw that we had won the mixed team division (to be fair there was only 1 other team, but the win was kind of cool.)
We hope this is a first of many family races, only we hope to be in better shape next time!

more spring pics here

My very own Bed

Pax was in love as he got to sleep in his very own queen size bed all by himself at the hotel tonight. He is such a peaceful little boy. I hope he doesn't get used to it though because we're not buying him a queen bed just yet!

Here Comes Trouble

This is a picture of Pax's latest stunt when having his diaper changed. As soon as his diaper is off he rolls over and smiles. This is why he is on the floor in this picture. Changing tables have become too dangerous.



Pax's hands are cracked because he is always sucking on them with vigor and TONS of drool. So we have resorted to bandaging his hands to protect them and keep Neosporin on them. When we eats we have been putting sandwich baggies over the bandages so they don't get rice cereal smeared into them. Evidently Pax finds the bags to be delicious and more appealing than his cereal. Ridiculous!



I took some time at my conference last week to shop for Pax at Children's Place. I couldn't resist these cute shades and sun hat. :)

New Milestone

This morning Pax was playing in his excersaucer while I was making coffee. I had put a few extra non attached toys on it. He likes to throw them off and then look at me as if I took them. But today...he threw one of them off, then stood up on his tiptoes and strained his neck over the tray to see where his toy went. Object permanence and the discovery of the force of gravity over his toys! :) I've been waiting for a couple weeks for him to discover this.
He also wore his first pair of real shoes today, little sneakers. I will try and get a pic up them soon.