Say Cheese!

Maverick has learned to smile and say "cheese!" when he sees my camera.

Here he is posing while taking a bite of a hunk of cheese!

Think he knows he's eating something he shouldn't? Look at that devilish grin!

How Sweet!

Our little Mitchell is all boy...rough & tough, dirty & adventurous...but he sure can be the sweetest little thing!

1 - We started swim lessons on Monday, along with about 30 other kiddos.  Each teacher called the students for their class and the kids ran up front ready to swim!  Mitchell ran up front when he heard his name, but then said "Wait, I have to tell my Mommy something."  He bee-lined back to me in the crowd, threw his arms around me and said "I wanted to tell you that I love you."  Then, he quickly turned on his heels and headed for the pool.  What a sweatheart!

2 - I'm still working 2ish days a week at PwC (and am loving it!)  When I got home from work yesterday, the boys were riding bikes in the driveway.

Mitchell - "Mom, you're home!  Where did you get those work clothes?" 
Me - "I bought them at the store, why?" 
Mitchell - "Because you look BEAUTIFUL!"

Seriously, he is NOT learning this from Jacob!

3 - We finally saw our first fireflies/lightening bugs of the season on Tuesday night!  Mitchell and I created a bug jar and set out on our hunt!  We had so much fun tracking them down.  He had no qualms about reaching out his little hands to try and gently grab them.  We caught five or six, but as our hunt was winding down Mitchell decided to let all by one go. "Let's let them be free, Mommy."  He kept one token firefly, which he justified in that he was "saving it from the rain".  We've got an animal lover on our hands! :)

Happy Father's Day!!!

We certainly got to spend some quality family time together on Father's Day as we drove the 5 hours home from Oklahoma!

Here is Daddy and his boys at a park that we stopped at on the way home to burn off some energy!

And just a few other shots of Jacob and the boys this month.

Maverick is a big fan of showering with Daddy!






And Mitchell LOVES to help him with yardwork!

They absolutely love playing Wii, and Daddy is the help resource! (Maverick's remote doesn't have any batteries in it...but he loves swinging it around at the TV anyway!)



We also had dinner with Grampy (my Dad). Aren't we lucky to have such great men in our lives? :)

2011 Folks Family Reunion

We headed to Oklahoma for the annual Folks Family Reunion for the weekend. What a great trip :)

Granny was nice enough to house us for the weekend. Here we are below with Katy and Jordan too! (Jacob's sister and her fiance). Even the little dog, Mindy, made the family photo :)

The boys found lots of fun ways to entertain themselves at her house. Maverick played with her garden hose for hours one evening while Jacob and Mitchell went to see Kung Fu Panda.






The doggie door was the favorite toy of the weekend.

Monkey See

Monkey Do

Here is Maverick and Jordan at the reunion picnic.

Jacob and his sis at the picnic.

Jacob's Dad (David) and brother (Connor) from Maine/New Hampshire (they're moving) made the trip for the reunion. Although David has seven children (3 step-sons, 2 sons, 2 daughters), only two boys have the Folks last name (Jacob and Connor). Since Connor doesn't have kids yet (whew!), our boys are the only Folks name sakes thus far.....so here are the five Folks men.

Oh, the things they say....

A few of my favorite quotes from Mitchell....

1 - "Mom, why is your bank a building, and mine is a pig?"

2 - Mitchell was swinging around a long stick in the park.  When I asked him to set it down so that he didn't hit anyone, he responded "But then how am I going to save the Galaxy?"

3 - Maverick was crying in his carseat and Jacob said "Maverick, what is wrong?"  Mitchell responded for him by saying "He is pitiful, Daddy."

4 - Mitchell threw a big fit when we were leaving an activitiy.  When we got home, I talked with him about his behaviour and asked him nicely not to act like that anymore....to which he responded "I just want to throw one more fit tomorrow and then I'll be all done throwing fits!"  I am happy to report that he did not throw a fit the next day (but he certainly has since!)

Mitchell continues to have a crazy vocabulary, he often uses words like "participate" or "disgusting" or "frustrated" or "dilemma", usually in the right context.  He loves to talk about words that rhyme, opposites and synonms.  It so fun to watch his little brain learn!

Debuting Baby #3

Yes, you read correctly! Our crazy household is about to get crazier! Baby #3 is due November 12th (but Jacob's has high hopes of an 11/11/11 birthday).

We have decided not to find out the gender, and really hope we can actually stick with that decision this time! Mitchell is excited to have another sibling and Maverick obviously has no clue.

Although Maverick does seem to notice that my stomach looks different! My little cuddle bug Maverick loves to cuddle on my bare skin. Funny, kid! If I wear a scoop neck shirt, he'll pull it down enough to rest his whole head on my chest. When we're laying down, he loves to pull up my shirt and lay his head on my stomach. He did a double take of my stomach the other day like...this thing looks and feels different than normal. Just wait, kid!

I'm in my 17th week, and things are going great! I was lucky enough to have no morning sickness (thanks, Baby!) and I haven't been terribly tired either.

With both boys, I have started "showing" around 16 weeks, and it look like pregnancy #3 is following suit. I'm barely squeezing into select pieces of my regular wardrobe, but I finally pulled the tub of maternity clothes out of the attic yesterday.

I have been able to feel baby flutters for a long time (starting at 11 weeks, which seems early to me!), but no big kicks yet. I just looked back at my records from Maverick's birth and it looks like I felt his first kicks at 18 weeks, so we'll have to see what next week brings.

Week 14

Week 17


Oh, this poor little guy has no idea what's coming his way!

San Francisco!

We took a family trip to San Fran for the holiday weekend, and had such a great time! Beware of picture overload below!

Jacob is in San Fran for work so the boys and I flew alone...something I was a little scared to do, but as usual...they pleasantly suprised me. I'd give them a 9 on both flights :)

Due to Jacob's reoccuring work project, we've been to San Fran and Napa area a few times in the last few years, so I wasn't sure we'd find new and different things to do...but we did!

We enjoyed the Acquarium.  Most kiddos were little squeemish about dipping their hands in the water and actually touching the animals, but as you can see from the below video....not our boys. Mitchell thinks everyone he meets is immediately his friend, so he's trying to give the play by play of the contents of the fish tank to some "new friends".

Aren't the jelly fish beautiful? :)

Jacob did a wine tasing at a local winery. They offered non-alcoholic kid's tastsings too, which Mitchell LOVED. He requested to go back a few more times, but this was our only stop.

He did get to taste a few other things though....like some Ghiradelli host chocolate, complete with whipped cream.

I think Mitchell's favorite activity of all was the Exploratorium. A kid's paradise of all kids of hand on science exhibits. Their water fountains were in (unused) toilets!

San Fran is known for it's killer hills and we definitely walked our fair share. There was actually a group of girls that cheered at me as I pushed our stroller up one of the hills. They had left their kiddos at home and were doing a girls trip, so they had an appreciation for our struggles pushing 80 pounds up the killer hills!

One of the most popular sites in San Fran is Lombard Street...the curviest street in the world.  Cars were lined up for blocks to drive down Lombard street and there is a huge crowd of people gathered around it (I can't imagine how annoying that is to the people who live on Lombard!)

Against my better judgement, Jacob talked me into letting him walk with the cars down Lombard pushing the stroller (or really holding tightly onto the stroller while walking down the steep slope).  The cars have to go super slow due to the curves, so it didn't slow them down at all and quite a few spectators got a kick out of it.  The boys were napping, so they were none the wiser!

Lombard from the top

Mitchell and the boys coming down Lombard.

We stayed at the same hotel (Sheraton Fisherman's Wharf) this trip as we did 2 years ago. The picture that I took of Mitchell in our bed with our pillow is still one of my favorites, so I needed one of Maverick to match!

Mitchell - 15 months

Maverick - 15 months

Mitchell's favorite part of the hotel room was the fold-out couch, which was his bed for the week. 

Jacob "Mitchell, do you want to watch this couch turn into a bed?"

Mitchell "You mean it's a Transformer?"

He was all to happy to sleep in his transformer bed each night :)

You can't go to San Fran without riding a historic Cable Car!

The boys aboard the historic Cable Car (can you believe they are BOTH looking AND smiling?)

We burned off some steam at a beautiful inner city park/green space with a pretty waterfall.

Jacob and I toured the Museum of Modern Art one afternoon during nap time. The boys must've liked the peacefulness because they slept the entire time. One lady stopped me to tell us that she thought our stroller full of sleeping boys was the best exhibit in the entire museum. :)

Mitchell checking out the Bay Bridge.

Mav and Mommy at Pier 39

There was an area for the kids to drive a pretend street car at the Railroad Museum....both boys enjoyed it....Mitchell a little too much. We had to do a lot of coaxing to get him out of there!

He became best friends with the worker at the museum. They had many conversations about everything from cable cars to batman.

Conductor Mitchell

 

Jacob and Mitchell took a "Rocket Boat" ride in the Bay (you might be able to make them out in the middle, waving). Mitchell really enjoyed it and continued to talk about how no one (even the Flash) is fast enough to catch the Rocket Boat.

We enjoyed watching the (wild) Sea Lions that lay out along the docks on Pier 39. We even ate lunch at the Sea Lion Cafe, overlooking the Sea Lions. It was one of more challenging meals with the boys though, so we didn't enjoy the scenery as much as we'd like!

We ended the trip with a Bay Cruise! Here are the 4 of us in front of the Golden Gate Bridge.

Me: "Mitchell, do you see the Golden Gate Bridge?"

Mitchell: "I see a bridge, but I don't see any golden gates."

So true....

Mitchell brought along his fishing pole just in case...but we did catch a thing :( 

I think Jacob threatened to take Maverick to Alcatraz (in the background) to illicit this response.

Here is Mitchell and Jacob at the Academy of Sciences Museum (the Zebras are stuffed).



Although some of us got more rest than others on the trip, we're all a little glad to be settled back in at home!