Aly’s First Year

One Month

Our little girl turned one month old today! Seems like she’s been with us much longer than that. She’s definitely part of our family. It’s been a while since the last post. We took a quick video tonight so Aly could say hi.

We followed up this video shoot by watching the video of her birth. It would likely be rated PG, but it still may not be suitable for the blog. Instead, enjoy another video of Aly from a couple days ago.

Back Yard Photo Shoot

This weekend we had a fairly impromptu photo shoot in our back yard. Nothing too fancy, we just realized most of the pictures we have of Aly are in her Rock & Play sleeper and we thought it might be nice for the world to know that there’s more to her life than this:

Our good friend, Bethany offered to take a few shots for us. A few of our favorites were:

Jack and the Interlude

This week in my office, while doing typical youth ministry research, I ran across a video of the Interlude Dance. I already knew the song but hadn’t seen that specific video. I thought it was super fun so, during a lull in the action this morning, I broke it out and taught Jack. He loves music, dancing and general craziness so it was a hit with him immediately!

In case you are interested in a little Interlude of your own, check out the full dance below and get ready to break it down in your living room!

Swim Day

It was a pretty warm day today and we were all home so after our afternoon naps, we decided to break out the water toys. First, we set up a fun sprinkler that shoots out balls. Jack was pretty excited…until the water started going and he was actually getting wet. Then he wasn’t sure about the cold water spraying.

Eventually, after going with me a bunch of times, he was up for trying it on his own and had a blast. After that, we worked together to blow up Jack’s inflatable pool. He didn’t seem to mind the cold water much at all this time.

 

Not to be outdone, Melissa was giving Aly her own “water” fun, playing for the first time with a little play mat we have called “Under the Sea.” It was the first time she’s really played like that and she did well!

All in all, it was a pretty terrific day together as a family!

Photo(s) of the Day: First Week Home

Didn’t get a chance to post these earlier so I thought I’d put a few random pics up from our first week or so home with Aly.

So far, Jack’s done really well with Aly, wanting to take care of her and talking (big shock!) about her and to her often.

Babies are always cute when they are so tiny but I can never get past her little toes.

She’s had a few visits to the doctor early on, but we have the all clear now and she’s doing great!

This just cracked me up. No setup to this, I just held her out one day and she stayed perfectly straight. No knee bending at all. Seemed like a David Blaine magic trick or something.

It’s been a great couple of weeks. I really am blessed with an incredible family!

Baby Jack = 500,000 Views!

We’ve got a little celebrity on our hands.  I posted this on twitter a while back but Jack’s been a viral video phenomenon over the last few months.  At the time I first posted it I think it had like 160,00 views, which i thought was crazy.  Well, as of this weekend, it is up to 510,000!  Half a stinking million?  Why you say?  Obviously because…well we really have no idea why.  Sure he’s cute and all but seriously, there are plenty of cute baby videos online.  It’s not even the first of the videos of his first swim.  It’s the fourth in a series we posted. He’s not really laughing or doing anything crazy. I guess Jack is just that awesome.

A few other, far more amazing videos with fewer views:

• The Earth is Yours live by Gungor (235,000)
• Treat Your Mother Right by Mr. T (200,000)
• AFV Tantrum Boy (26,000)

I thought things settled down in terms of views back in March but then things picked back up again. Many days it’s getting over 10,000 views…per day! What is up with that? For a while I wondered if some random website or celebrity linked to it, or if it was being used by some secret spy network to pass messages or something (seriously), but from what I can tell most of the people clicking on it come from YouTube itself.

A few fun observations from looking at the stats & comments:

• As expected, more women than men watch, accept in Saudi Arabi…what’s up with that?
• There are views from all sorts of places that even Carmen San Diego wouldn’t recognize. Seychelles? Gabon, Mauritania & New Caledonia? Over 1,600 in Moldova. And don’t forget Djioubti!
• Some highlights from the comments:
  • “Kick with your arms!”
  • “The dad looks like Tom Cruise man.”
  • “the next seal team six member in training.”
  • “I want to be a dad like that.”
  • “So cute I want to give you $345.7653587465847467485957464624162783944”
  • “HIS EYES ARE SO BLUE”
  • …how did I get here?”

Below are a few of the stats I pulled a couple of weeks ago, in case anyone’s interested.

Happy Mother’s Day

We knew Mother’s Day might be a little crazy with a new baby at home so Jack and I planned to get ready a few weeks back. I was running low on creativity so I asked Jack what he thought we should do and he said we should make a Facebook video. I thought that was a great idea (much better than the random stuff I’d thought of) so that afternoon we headed our on an “adventure” photo shoot. This morning Jack woke mommy up wearing his prince costume and showed her what we made.

We’re pretty thankful for our princess!

A Rustic Morning

We had a fun Saturday morning. Aly’s doing so well that we thought we try to go out somewhere. We got all dressed up…

And went out to New Salem.

We made some Jack soup.

Checked out the mill, a favorite of his from the book Pancakes, Pancakes.

He liked checking out the outhouse…boy was I glad that it wasn’t functional as he banged on them like drums and peaked inside.

Jack especially liked to climb the wagon and then use it as his stage. He wants to be a little worship leader!

Afterward we went to Westwood Lodge, a huntinglodge style place we’ve never tried, for a lunch of “pine cones” and sandwiches.  Fun times!

Photo(s) of the Day: May 10

It was another enjoyable day at home with our family. We’re loving Aly’s new room. It’s great having a bright, fun place for her!

I’ve been loving iCloud & Photo Stream. It’s hard to believe but I’ve actually begun primarily using my iPhone to take pictures. For one, they all sync with the iPad & home computer automatically. Plus, it really seems to take great pictures. There are times I think the iPhone pictures come out better than pics from a fancy SLR. I thought the one below of Aly’s eyes was particularly impressive for a cell phone camera.

Lately, Jack’s been calling Melissa “Snow White” (we recently watched the movie). Most of the time, he calls himself “Sneezy” until it’s time to save her, at which time, he refers to himself as “Prince. He had been coming in our bedroom every morning and pretending to wake her up with a kiss. The last couple of mornings, however, have been extra special. He’s come in and wanted to kiss “both Snow Whites,” Melissa & Aly. So fun watching him be a big brother!

No long story here…Jack’s breaking it down like our little Ray Charles.