Not to be outdone by her brothers

With a birthday and losing a tooth to follow, Becca is having no trouble keeping up with her brothers. She is learning to do new things everyday it seems. This past week she has gotten tons better at sitting up. In fact she was sitting so well yesterday that I left her to run into the kitchen for something. Unfortunately she chose that moment to fall forward (the only direction where the bobby pillow wasn't there to soften her fall) and plant face first into the hard wood floor. She came up screaming but seemed no worse for the wear after some cuddle time with Mom.


Next Becca chose this week to work on her razzing skills. She is quite the pro now and can spray not only herself but everyone who comes close to admire the new skill. This of course only magnifies the drooling troubles we've had so she is going through many outfits each day. Good thing her wardrobe can keep up!

And finally, we actually got her to roll over on camera this past weekend. At first, she was so good at rolling when no one was looking that I even suspected that her brothers were actually the ones rolling her. Then she let us in on the secret but failed to preform on camera - until now that it. So for all to enjoy, may I present Becca the roller:

The tooth fairy's visit

A few mornings ago, Michael bit into a bagel and announced that his tooth hurt. Upon closer inspection, it was found to be loose - quite loose actually. I tried to talk to Michael about how all the teeth in his mouth were baby teeth and that they get loose and fall out to make room for big teeth that will grow in. He began to freak out! Poor Michael who likes to be prepared for everything was caught completely off guard. But who knew we'd have to prep him for loosing teeth while he was still 4 years old. My recollection is that a few kids loose teeth at 5, but most start at 6 or 7. However, here we found ourselves a full month before his 5th birthday. So I continued to talk calmly about the whole process and luckily when I got to the part about the tooth fairy he remembered a story he had read at Grandpa's about a bunny putting her tooth under her pillow for the tooth fairy. With that small thought to latch on to, everything started to seem ok to him. He then wanted to know all the whys, so we talked about how teeth have roots and that the roots of the baby teeth get old and and start to dissolve until the tooth falls out. So every time he would wiggle his tooth and it would move more he's announce, "Mom, it's losing more roots!"

The tooth has fallen out now - in fact it fell out at Jon's party - and Michael received a quarter from the tooth fairy. Now he can't decide whether to put it in the change jar that we are filling as "Chucky Cheese money" or to spend it on something more immediate. And to make the decision even more fun, he has a second loose tooth he plans to put under his pillow soon.

Tim and I just look at each other and think that we weren't expecting to be playing this parenting roll quite so soon!

Happy Birthday Jon!

Today Jon is two years old. We tried to sing "Happy Birthday" to him this morning and he just screamed "NO" and ran away. Apparently even at two getting older can be a bit scary. We actually had a party for him on Sunday with family. It was a joint birthday party for Jon and my dad and we had a blast!

Last week Michael had talked me into party blowers for the great event. I thought Jon would get a kick out of them since they had Lightning McQueen on them, but I'm not sure he even noticed that - he was having too much fun blowing them.


We had delicious brownies and ice cream that were a big hit!





And then Jon got to open his presents. He was a bit overwhelmed as we took each present away after he opened it and Michael kept bringing him more presents to open. I think he would have rather got one or two presents and been allowed to play with them right away. lol Oh well, I'm sure big brother Michael will teach Jon about the importance of having lots of presents by next year. :)


Here are a few of his favorite presents:
My dad made him a wooden school bus full of little people.


And we found a toy lawn mower at a garage sale this summer. We couldn't get the bubble blower in it to work, but Jon had a blast pushing it around the yard. I think he was entertained by it for about an hour after the party.


We even got Michael a present for the day so they could have matching sun glasses.


Happy Birthday Jonathan!!

Catch up

Well, we have been on vacation for about a month and now home again for a week of recovery. I'm finally starting to get back into the flow of normal life. So let me catch you up on our vacations:

First, we went to Boston to see family. Here are a few highlights:
We had a blast candle pin bowling. Michael loved it and stayed fairly competitive with the adults. Jon had so much fun that he never wanted to wait his turn, but then he discovered the ball return and spent the night "catching" each of the balls as it came down the track. Even Becca got some fun times!






We also visited the Boston Commons and watched the ducks.


And the trip is never complete without getting to see great-grandparents. So much fun!




Then we returned to Grand Rapids for a week which included Uncle Andy's wedding. Michael and his cousin Cody were the ring bearers and did a fabulous job.


Finally we were off again to a cottage on Lake Michigan with the DeJong side of the family. Thank goodness for a large remodeled cottage because we had 8-10 adults, 3 kids, and 3 babies there. Cody and Jon got along great as they both love cars, trains, and running around in circles. And they both loved to try and be like Michael too. The babies had a blast being pasted around and loved sharing each other's toys. The older boys absolutely loved being down at the beach and begged anyone to take them. The babies however were not so comfortable at the beach and preferred to stay inside.








While we were down there we also went house hunting. For those who haven't heard, Tim got a job teaching in Holland so we will be moving there next month. We are excited to say that we ended our vacation by making an offer on this fabulous home!


If you would like to see more vacation pictures check out our flickr site:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tchaig/