Places to go, People to see

Lately Camden has enjoyed sitting in his Dada's car and pretending to drive it. Whenever he hears the garage door go up, he scrambles for the stairs and makes a mad dash to the garage before Steven gets out of his car. He mostly likes to turn the wheel and push the button to turn on the emergency flashers (good idea, Camden). For those of you who are worried, the car is in park the whole time with the engine off.

Hey Camden, It's illegal to talk and drive at the same time.

My Little Helper

This was so sweet. One day I was doing some extra cleaning around the house. This included washing our glass back door. Camden was playing contently before he noticed what I was doing. After a few minutes he came by to check it all out. I started complaining to him about all my low windows and doors getting dirty about 2 1/2 feet up. It didn't take him long to walk away from me. I thought that he had heard enough. He hadn't, so he walked over to the drawer where I keep my towels. He opened the drawer and pulled one out. He came over and helped me scrub the window.

This was the sweetest thing he has ever done in his life.

What a sweetie.

Who does this kid belong to?

I am not quite finished blogging about our summer (don't worry Todd you will get your blog post soon!). I just had to blog about this before I could finish the summer posts.
There are many things that Camden does that leave both Steven and myself just baffled. We are sometimes left wondering "Where did this kid come from?". Most of the time we are eager to blame the behavior on each other. However, this latest incident leaves us wondering "Who does this kid belong to?".
We were sitting down to dinner the other night as a family. Steven and I were at the table and Camden was in the middle of us in his booster. He had finished his dinner earlier than we had and he was enjoying some ice cream treats. We are still doing everything we can to fatten him up, and he is eating much better now. Steven and I were enjoying our pizza and spinach salad when Camden kept asking for something on the table. We couldn't figure out what he wanted. We kept offering him things and he would turn them down. As a joke I offered him a piece of spinach thinking he would spit it out or throw it on the ground. Of course the opposite happened. He ate the spinach right up. I gave him several more pieces thinking he would think one was enough. He of course ate them right up. Camden wanted more asking please over and over. Steven still wanting to fatten Camden up finally said "Camden if you finish your ice cream first, then we will give you some more spinach". I couldn't help but laugh. Whoever heard of a father reasoning with his son to eat his ice cream so he could have spinach for dessert. We truly do not know where Camden gets his food cravings. They surely do not come from either of us. We would much rather eat ice cream over spinach.

Catch me if you can

For those of you who don't know Pop (Steven's dad) he is extremely nervous around any kid that moves. This makes for interesting times whenever we are with him, especially with our thrill seeking boy. On this day we took Camden to a park near a lake. This was his first visit so he had a blast. He loves to go down the slide, and now he is even brave enough to try going down on his back. He is still a little wobbly but he has a ball.

In this picture you can see the pure enjoyment on Camden's face and the pure fear on Pop's face. Everything turned out fine in the end.

No harm done.

To see more pictures from their visit, you can go to our website.

Our First Nephew!

We are proud to announce the birth of our first Nephew Lane Aaron to Steven's brother Daryl and his wife Diana! Lane was born August 8, 2008 at 5:04 PM central time. Lane weighed 8 pounds 14 ounces and he is a cutie. Lane joins his big sister Brynna to make this now a family of four. We are so excited for all of them as they make this new transition. Camden is excited for another cousin to play with. We can't wait to meet him in November. Until then, pictures are going to have to be good enough. To view pictures of their precious boy you can go to their website at http://www.dtripp.com/

We see the future

This was kind of funny. When Chap and Kathy were here we had fun walking around town being tourists. At one point I noticed that the couple in front of us were wearing the older version of what we happened to be wearing that day. Though you can't see it in the picture, Steven and I are both wearing khaki shorts.

Get a good look at me and Steven in about 40 years.

At least we will still be arm in arm.

4th of July

Today is actually the 4th of August (Happy Birthday Pop!) so I thought it was about time to catch up on my blogging. We have had such a crazy busy summer, but we wouldn't have it any other way. Part of the business was a visit from Steven's good friend from college Chap and his girlfriend Kathy. They made a quick trip to the Northwest and dropped by our area for a couple of days. We had a lot of fun hanging out with them and catching up. It was also Camden's first time meeting Chap. They have become fast friends. We really enjoyed their visit and hope to see them more often.

Look at the difference a year makes. Camden could barely sit up a year ago holding onto the flags. Now we can barely get him to sit still with the flags. He is our little patriotic boy. I hope he doesn't mind this when he is 18!

Look at the cute couple!

What a cute little family. Camden didn't much care for getting his picture taken in this last one. Anytime we try to get him to sit still for a couple of seconds he thinks it is the worst torture in the world. As goes life with a busy one year old!

First Family Hike

For my birthday this year we took our first family hike. We recently got a back pack for Camden and we were excited to try it out. It was about a two mile hike round trip. Camden did great. Steven carried him all the way to the top of the water fall and I carried him back down. This was just about the only time we were thankful he is a little guy. We enjoyed it so much we hope to go on more hikes this summer.

It was a great way to spend a Saturday!

Birthday Palooza!

This picture was taken to begin the official start to what we lovingly refer to as "Birthday Palooza". It starts in June and ends in September. My Sister, brother and I all have birthdays in the summer in consecutive months June, July and August. We have the tradition of meeting at a restaurant and having dinner to celebrate each of our birthdays. Then we added our spouses Ty and Steven's. Birthday Palooza starts with mine in June. Ty and Liz's birthday's are a week apart in July. Next is my brother Chris's in August and it all ends with Steven's in September. This is not including our out of town family which would add three more birthdays to our summer Calendar (you must be present to be celebrated).

We all really have a good time and I look forward to it every year!

Father's Day

I know that this is a late post for Father's day. We actually flew home from Texas on Father's day. I didn't feel like that was a good time to celebrate so we postponed the holiday for another week.

This is the last picture we took in Texas right before leaving for the airport. Notice the boys are in matching shirts. On the way to the airport Camden gave his Daddy a card and the book on CD Bringing Up Boys, by James Dobson. He has a long commute to work and plenty of time to listen to it.

What a perfect gift!

This was a really sweet moment between father and son on the plane home.

Don't let us mislead you, he was not like this the entire flight!

We did finally get to celebrate Father's day a week later.

We met Steven after work at one of his favorite spots the Edmond's pier.

Camden enjoyed the beach more than the pier.

He threw rocks in the water for the first time in his life.

He is such a boy!

Steven/Daddy, We hope you enjoyed your belated Father's Day. We appreciate you getting up so early and working so hard to provide so much for us. You are the best Husband/Daddy in the world.

We love you!