Super Mom

At KatrinaRun's end of year (financial year) picnic she was given the "Super Mom" Award. As you can see by this picture she manages to be on conference calls while tending to Benjamin. She surely is super!

 

TRex Birthday!

We went with to TRex and MomiDomi and FamiDomi to Buca Di Beppo to celebrate TRex's Birthday. A high school boy's soccer team serenaded her with a hearty rendition of happy birthday, she was a little embarassed.


PS....If you were the family on the other side of the curtain, you should know that you are weird. 

Lazy Saturday

We played airplane for awhile.



And then we practiced cheering on the Irish. Fall she is a coming quickly.

 

Ben meets one of the college girls (gone mild)

Ben got to meet one of Mom's bestest friends and college roomate over the weekend. They both had a lot of fun even though he was a little bit moody, a little bit of a stinker.

Root Root Root For the Cubbies......

Cute kid...(and mom) TERRIBLE team.

Should not encourage this

It is really cute, and it is downright hillarious, but we cannot allow this to happen.

That's right chien has started grabbing dropped pacifiers in his mouth and holding them just like Ben does. We try very hard not to laugh because this is not a good idea, but it is so funny.

Ben Goes to School

Ben has been in daycard for about two weeks now. He seems to really like, so much so that he is smiling when I put him in his car seat. His teachers say that he is a joy and that he rarely cries. I wish he rarely cried at home.

Here is a cute pic of him getting ready for school.

 

Chien's Big Day

Chien turned the big 04 on Thursday. He got the best card in the world from his cousin dogs Libby and Cooper. It was a birthday card made out of rawhide. Here is a shot of him saying thanks.


Here is a great shot of him when he took it to bed to cuddle with it!


When will they come up with BDay cards made out of beef jerky for people? I would love a card like that.....hint hint 

Glamour Shot

We had some Pics taken at Kiddie Kandids, and they gave us this montage for free. Thought you might like to see it, but take my word for it it looks much better when its almost 2 feet long. 

New Car for Trex

Last Saturday KatrinaRun, TRex, Ben and myself went looking for a new car for Aunt TRex.

We test drove lots of cars, and I am left with the same feeling I always get when dealing with car salesmen. Mainly, how in the world can they keep their jobs. If these people actually make money behaving as they do, I could make a fortune. Or maybe their are people who can be convinced to spend $30,000 on the first car they test drive when they are only partially in the market. Its infuriating how many of them totally drop you once it become aparent that you aren't going to buy the car that day.

BTW if you are looking for a Lexus may I plug Tom Dean @ Woodfield Lexus if I ever buy another lexus it will probably be from him. Why not make it 3/3 :)

Lots of Pictures

If you have a fair bit of time you can take a look at a Kodak Gallery of lots of pictures that we just ordered snapshots of.

Click Here if you don't want to sign in.

New Firsts!

I got home from running last night and KatrinaRun was soooo excited. Apparently Ben had three firsts all in one afternoon. Even better was that all three were caught on Video. (Oh BTW the videos contain audio so you might want to mute them if you are at work.)

At first he played with his rattle for the first time, and then he focused on his gym toys and grab for them for this first time.

Click here to watch Ben play with his toys.

Its amazing to think that sometime in the last 2-3 weeks Ben has figured out that he is an independent person from the world around him. Imagine if we kept making such grand deductions our entire life.

The bigger first was that he rolled over from back to front for the first time ever. And he did it three times in one night!

Click here to watch Ben Rollover.

Caribou Coffee

I have been drinking waaaay too many turtle mochas recently, and something always bothered me about the store.

I finally ran into this quote on http://www.lileks.com/ that described my feelings exactly....

"Nice little coffee shop, even if they ask if they can start a coffee drink for you. It makes that sound like such a long and arduous procedure. Great! We’ll begin the work on the blueprints promptly, and we should begin construction within the month."

If you have a senese of humor at all like mine you will appreciate james lileks.

The Budha

You can rub the tummy for luck.

His future wife is going to love this picture.

New Accomplishments

Over the weekend Ben started to do two really cute things.

The first that we saw was that he began noticing his hand. Its kind of funny because he only does it with his right hand, and it doesn't hold his attention very long, but he is amazed by it.

He also has begun to be fasicinated, and I mean fascinated by himself in the mirror, he doesn't really talk to himself, but he will stare for a long time at the mirror.

I will try to post pictures if I am able to capture any of these cute new tricks.

Every day a new adventure!

Ben's Great (In all senses of the word) Uncle Kevin and Aunt Cindy were in town for a convention. They took the train out to Aurora and the fam drove out there to see them. This was Ben's first time with them, and both Katrina and I's first time meeting Aunt Cindy. The three of us really liked her.

She said no pictures of her, but I thought you might like to meet her too.


Later in the day, Ben listened to cousin Tim explain all about video games.

 

Aaaaannnnnnd their off..

Alex,Trex, and I got to spend the afternoon playing the ponies at Arlington Park. CEDA NW, an organization that the three of us have done a fair bit of work for, holds a fundraiser there in the spring, and they decided to invite us. (KatrinRun also volunteers there, but since she just went back to work she couldn't take the afternoon off.) Over the course of the afternoon we learned that we know a lot more about income taxes and computers than we do about horse racing.

Here is a shot of Alex pretending that he knows how to read the racing form

...(Although later in the day he won an exacta bet....he obviously know more than me...except what a 1:1 odds mean for a payout :) )

TRex shows off the first winning ticket of the day. She went 3 for 3 to open her afternoon!!!! In fact she didn't start to lose until I started copying her bets..Hmmmmmm.


Cool picture of the chicago skyline from the skybox we were in. More impressive in person. Can you guess which one the Sears tower is?


Trex and I pose in front of the horse that I won a $20 on! Thats me to the left of Trex the horse is on the right.

Yay me!

Just thought I would share the good news that I was promoted by Moto! It was announced at a big department meeting which was pretty cool.

Very exciting if I do say so myself.

Some CoWorkers and I are going to be celebrating at a local establishment with a round on me. It will be my first night out without the family since Ben came. This is a bad thing.

Baptism Part One

Solved the home internet problem. (FYI that cool new ethernet over powerline technology only works if you have the adaptor plugged in.)

The cake summarizes the day before it even starts.


Guests arrived through the rain to the church. We had to keep our eyes on this little guest as he tried to make a break for it.


The Baptism! (The priest said it was a good sign that he cried)


A nice picture of the extended family. (Sorry Momma Kay :) ) courtesy of Aunt Judy and her realyl nice camera.

Baptism Part Two

The after party begins....


The Godparents pose for a great shot.


Momma Kay and Papa get some Ben time.


After a busy day like this one, only mom can comfort the little guy.


 

First Shot

We have been having a little bit of computer trouble at the house so this is the only shot I can currently get on the web from Ben's big day. We should have more before too long.