Fun weekend

Owen had a couple of extra play buddies around this past weekend when our friends Chris and Leslie, and their two boys (Eli, 2, and Jacob, 9 mo) came down for a visit from Raleigh. Owen and Eli had fun "fishing" in the screened in porch, reading stories, playing with trains, and running around the Aquarium. Jacob did his best to keep up with the older boys using his impressive seal-crawl skills.



Last night, when another friend stopped by, Nate had Owen practicing all the various sounds he can make (e.g., "Owen, what noise does a cow make?"...."mooooooooo"). Nate threw in a new impression for Owen to imitate, that of my various grunts and groans, which I can't seem to avoid when attempting to get up from any seated or prone position these days. Clearly, Owen thinks Dad's impressions of Mom are spot-on:

Two Years Old!

Owen celebrated his second birthday this weekend, and though we have all come down with colds in the past few days, Owen didn't let it slow him down. On Saturday morning (his actual birthday), Owen's favorite sister duo, Rosey and Maddy (along with their crafty mom Kerry), came over with quite the birthday celebration: balloons, donuts, a hand made "2" t-shirt, and a handcrafted picture board on which to hang his favorite photos or works of art. Here is the trio, enjoying their celebratory donuts.

Nate was away on Saturday, fishing on the Outer Banks (he made up for his absence on O's actual birthday by bringing home tons of fresh mahi and yellowfin tuna!), so we celebrated as a family this morning. We decided that instead of birthday cake, we'd do a fun pancake breakfast. Nate fashioned a dog for Owen, which we decorated with whipped cream and blueberries. Owen went for the head first.....



All day long, Owen enjoyed playing with his new birthday loot - wrestling with the balloons, modeling his new t-shirts, playing songs on his new keyboard, reading books, fishing for puzzle pieces, and drawing at his new easel. Aunt Rosie, we'll wait for your visit to let Owen experience Playdough - for now he just enjoys dumping out the contents of the bucket and replacing them again! Thank you everyone for the wonderful gifts, cards, college fund donations, and all the well wishes.

Since turning two, Owen seems to have decided its time to expand his vocabulary. Though his favorite 'word' continues to be "doe-ka", which he repeats again and again to himself all day long (what does it mean, I wonder?), today he said "all done" and "highchair" - at least according to our interpretive skills!

One month to go until Baby Bacheler's due date...