Dana Sillyface

My sweet Dana girl loves to make silly faces...here are a few:

Birthplace of Snoopy

In case you didn't know, Charles Schultz, the creator of the comic strip Peanuts was from Santa Rosa. In addition to a museum and skating rink named in his honor, all around town you can find statues of different characters from his comic strip...when my mom was here last May, we went on a little scavenger hunt to see if we could find all 50 statues. We got up to almost 20! And since then we have found a few more...Good times!

Snowboard Bunny

So, Kimmy has taken to wearing a little blue snow hat that Grandma Cowley bought her. I don't know why she has fallen so in love with it now, as we are currently in the middle of a heat wave here in California, but she is too cute in it and I have had a hard time convincing her to take it off. We'll see how long this phase lasts...

Ryan Duke - a photographic retrospective

I was going to do a long post all about Ryan's birth, but I got started and it was wearing me out...so for now, I am just going to post some pictures, so everyone can see how handsome he is, and give you a brief summary of his life so far...This is me, right after they officially admitted me to the hospital. As you can see, I was in good spirits. Ryan was 20 inches and 8.2 pounds when he was born. Pretty average size, but when I saw him for the first time, I said "oh, he's so small!" Here is the proud daddy:

These pics look a little weird, as Jared took them without the flash, cause he was trying not to make his first bath any worse:

He has since grown 1 3/4 inches and is up to 8.13 lbs. He is SUPER mellow. He only fusses for a short time when he is getting his diaper changed (really, who can blame him?) or when he is hungry, but as soon as his needs are met, he is happy to sit quietly using his shifty eyes to see what is going on around him. He has big dimples in both cheeks. I only have one on my left side, and just when I am smiling, but he has them all the time. As you can see, it was a poor choice of finger I used to point out his dimples, sorry!

The big kids couldn't wait to meet him:

Nate came with Daddy to bring Ryan and I home from the hospital. He couldn't be more pleased to finally have his little brother here. As he told me "I have been waiting my whole life to have a baby brother!"

The only "problem" we had the first few days of having Ryan home, was the big kids fighting over who got to hold him. Since his newness has worn off, the fighting over holding him has stopped, thank goodness, but they still want to hold him all the time and be great helpers.

I can't try and be modest here, I make BEAUTIFUL babies. When Ryan came out, he didn't have a cone head or any birthmarks or any of that baby acne...he is just one good lookin' baby!

They say babies don't smile before 6 weeks or so, but I have photographic evidence that this is not the case for Ryan, as he is only 2 weeks old in his super smiley picture, and no one will ever be able to convince me it was just gas.

Hopefully that is enough pictures for now for those of you who have been pestering me to update my blog. I have tons more, and I promise they will get posted in the next few days...keep checking back.

Ever wonder what it looks like when someone who is 9 months pregnant takes castor oil to start their labor? Well, here you go:

Yes, it really is that bad, but it does work.

School's Out for the Summer

Okay, so technically, school starts up again in less than 5 weeks, but I am really behind in my postings, and I felt like Nate needed some love on the blog. This school year was great because I was able to volunteer in Nate's class once a week and I really felt like I was able to get to know not just his teacher, but his classmates as well. For the last day of school, I was able to attend his BBQ party and it was really fun. It was cute to see all the kids "signing" each other's yearbooks.

Nate learned how to do the monkey bars really well this year. I was really impressed because I never really had the upper body strength to do the monkey bars very well, and I definitely couldn't do two at a time like Nate. The big thing this year in first grade was tether ball. All the kids were playing it and Nate got pretty into it too. He isn't the best, but he sure has a lot of fun doing it. In fact he asked me if I could get a tether ball for him so he could practice over the summer...I am still "thinking about it."Nate made some really good friends at school this year: Nate and AustinNate, Austin and Alexis

Nate and Jack
Nate's friend Darius crashing after the sugar high he got from all the goodies.Rebecca, Paige (Nate's "girlfriend") Nate, Diego and Devin all writing notes and pictures for Ms. Miller on the board.

First grade was an overwhelming success for Nate, not only did he develop some really neat friendships, but he also really developed a love for learning and an even greater love for reading (if that is possible). We did get some exciting news for Nate this past week or so too. At the end of 1st grade, he participated in the Terra Nova testing that they do for all 1st graders around the country. They only tested in reading and math, but Nate scored in the 94th percentile for reading and the 99th percentile for math, giving him an overall score in the 99th percentile. Way to go Nate, we are so proud of you!! Keep it up and you'll make us all rich someday!

Funny Quote

So Dana was giving me a foot rub tonight, and to help me relax even more, she offered to rub my temples by saying: "Mom, can I rub your pimples for you?"