Two month celebration

Tucker turned 4 yesterday! If you have talked to him in the past three months you know that his birthday is July 27th and he is having another car wash party. He began anticipating his school party back in mid-May (summer birthdays are celebrated at the end of school) and we've been celebrating ever since. We celebrated in St.Louis in early June and Hilton Head in early July. His little friend pool party was Saturday and then two days later... finally... it was July 27th.

The night before the party. So excited he can't sleep and ends up on our floor. The hardwood floor. Hmmm.

The spread of ice cream toppings LOTS of sprinkles, cherries, mint oreos, m&ms, whip cream, magic shell, etc.

Vinnie above. Tucker cleaning Cameron's car for him before he runs it through the car wash.

Tucker didn't stop scrubbing cars all day!

Issie and Calvin. Sometimes you just have to catch a meltdown in action.

July 27th

Mimi brought over birthday hats (Tucker is modeling one above along with his "water balloon mustache") and coffee cake for breakfast. Then we went to Chick-Fil-A with Issie and Jackson for lunch and play time. We came home and had some "naps" and then went to pizza. Just as we were heading out the door to go play mini golf, a huge thunderstorm hit us and we ended up just heading home.

Tucker and Spiderman... just before bed time!

Baby Blue Eyes

who crawls already... and he's fast.

Rain, rain, go away!

4th of July in Hilton Head
This was before the rain began.
We watched fireworks from the car in a parking lot fairly far from the actual fireworks. What you do for your 3-almost-4 year old. He liked them, but wouldn't even get out of the car he was so scared of being any closer.

Then for the rest of the week it just rained and rained. And we spent a lot of time in a small-ish condo with small children :) We tried to get out and figure out some adventures to take. At one point I was in the pool as it rained (no lightning) because I just needed to tire Tucker out before bedtime. We still had a fun week of family bonding!

Sweet cousins... Cia LOVES "baby Mac" and follows Tucker everywhere. It is so awesome to watch their friendships grow.

We did a joint birthday party since Cia turned two at the end of June and Tucker will turn four at the end of July.

Above: Bubble machine Tucker has been wanting for months.
Below: Snuggle time with Uncle Bri.

Lots of swimming time. Some beach time. Lots of raining time.

He loves George

Wildwood Forest

Tucker had a REALLY fun week doing VBS at Southside Methodist (his preschool). I called it professional VBS because there were 350 kids and it was high energy fun the whole time. The teenagers were up on the stage leading praise songs with all the kids jumping up and down singing... and that was just at the 9am drop off. It was wild & crazy & fun! We have listened to the CD of the music they learned only about 1, 045 times since two weeks ago. Kyle and I have the songs and motions permanently burned in our memories.

Road Trip '09

Mama, Tucker & Mac drove up to St.Louis for a couple weeks in early June. By ourselves. It was surprisingly GREAT. The boys were happy and patient for the entire MANY hours! On the way up, we stopped in Atlanta for 2 days. It was a highlight of the trip to play with Olivia, William & Marjorie!

We hit the ground running when we got to St.Louis. The first morning we headed to Grant's Farm with CIA! The face below is Cia's present "signature face." She is adorable and she and Tucker were sweet friends.

Tucker saying "Don't worry, Cia... I've got the map. I'll show you where to go!"

The goats at Grant's Farm are intense. Tucker handled it in the pin for awhile, but when he started getting attacked we got out of there and Uncle Casey helped him feed them outside the pin.

Above: Tucker with Herbie
Below: Our fantastic visit with Adam & Andrew. Deena's family was visiting from Cincinnati the first week we were there. I was so happy that we made it to St.Louis at the same time. Deena and I have been friends since we were 2 or 3 and it makes me a little weepy to watch our 3 year olds play together!!

"Cia! I can pick you up!"

Another big part of the trip was Tucker riding everywhere in my Mom's new convertible!

Above: My precious Grandma holding Mac and Below: My grandparents brought over some of the toys we played with at their house years ago... Tucker loved this boat!

Cia getting some special loving from Mac... eventually he has a death grip on her ear and she is begging for help!

Two more

Tucker is all about writing everything himself these days (with spelling help, of course!) He also has a fantastic imagination... While at Nan and Pop's he made a cookie store up in his room during "nap"time. He created this "Cookies For Sale" sign and put it up outside the door.

Also forgot this picture of Uncle Brian ("BMac") with Mac.

Mac at 6 months

For the virtual baby book:

* 16 pounds, 4 ounces (25%)
* 28 inches (80%)
* sitting up
* moving everywhere without formally crawling
* loves to "talk"
* great napper - morning and afternoon naps are 2ish hrs.
* still not perfect overnight (digressed during St.Louis trip - almost back to normal)
* loves his Daddio... huge smiles, kicking, etc when he sees him

Our Daddio

is incredible. He loves us so well. He works so hard at work and then comes home and plays hard with us. He is SO intentional with us and teaches us all the time. He gives the best hugs and just loves all over us. He will do anything goofy to make us laugh. He wrestles when we need to wrestle and snuggles when we need to snuggle. He just gets us.

So we make him cookie cakes with candles and crowns to wish him a Happy Father's Day!

Then we took him to Ponte Vedra for an awesome breakfast. Although my little brother Mac was annoyed we didn't let him take his morning nap, so he was a bit temperamental for the breakfast.

Then he set up my car wash in the yard.
In case you forgot about the car wash he made me last year...

now I bring my favorite umbrella in to it. And the car wash will be making another appearance for my 4th birthday. Because I want the exact same birthday party as my 3rd birthday. Yes, really. He is AMAZING at making car washes with me. Out of "VPC pipe" or blocks or legos... any medium will work.

I made him put on the crown again (this is my crown from my school "fake" summer birthday party in May) to finish off Father's Day 09. We love you Daddio -- Tuck & Mac