Just plain CUTE

Other than his incredible fussiness due to ROSEOLA (yeah, I'd never heard of it... wish I had been on the look-out), Eamon has been super cute.

He loves to wear beads. These are green ones that went with the Christmas Tree ornaments (well, ORIGINALLY went with the ornaments. Now they are situated in Eamon's toy box between his blocks and his train). He also likes to push around Tupperware lids. Yeah, I know. What a goof! :)

Watch as he takes off his beads then immediately puts them back on again. And then looks at himself to reiterate the fact that yes, he does look better with them on!




Eamon has fun eating and drinking. Sometimes he over does it. Then he fake coughs! :)




Eamon has always loved boxes. This one is big enough for him to sit in, but small enough to climb in and out of. He did break one of the corners apart, but he still loves it. He also likes to put things in it. So cute!

Eamon's first HUNT

Brendan grew up doing hunts on Easter.


And not just a little Easter Egg Hunt.


I'm talking individualized, complicated, rhyming poems leading to a hidden spot with another similar poem (and often a delicious treat or a nice prize), which leads to another and another... These hunts would take hours, often longer as whoever was a teenager at the time would say "this is stupid" or "I quit" (only to be guilted back in to the hunt).


These hunts often led:
--to parks to dig up more clues,
--to nearby schools or playing fields,
--across town to friends' houses (or even calling these teenage friends on the phone and singing them the listed bunny song to get the much-needed clue, not knowing for sure if you read the clue correctly -or if it was correctly written- and definitely leaving friends laughing at you for a long long long time),

--dirty laundry hampers ("and bring down the laundry, while you're at it!"),

--mailboxes ("and get the mail while you're out there!"), Etc.

The hunts often included hemming and hawing (that ALWAYS helped!), telling mom and dad that the clues don't make any sense (and sometimes they didn't, as if they had any control over it... after all, the Easter Bunny wrote and hid the clues!), looking EVERYWHERE in case the clue-seeker were to stumble across the clue (which occassionally happened but always confused things even more). The first clue was usually hanging outside your door when you woke in the morning (and there were always extras for visitors. One Easter a few years back, Bren's parents were up really late... there were the three kids, me, and two law schools friends that lived out of state who didn't travel home for Easter. Oh what fun!).

This year was a little bit different. Of course there were clues. And of course we all got them. (Even Bren's parents got a hunt... their first clue read: Your first clue is attached/ To the van's trailor hitch./ This year's bunny will prove/ That payback's a b!tc%. [Their hunt next year will be much harder!]) The rain and cold forced us to do Eamon's first hunt indoors.

Now, of course the hunts can't begin too difficult. So, it was easy to decide that Eamon's first hunt would be only challenging for a one-year-old. After his morning nap, we placed him on the floor in the living room. His job, which he did wonderfully, was to follow the egg trail. The process took quite a while because, as we expected, once he found that first egg filled with his first taste of mini Oreos, why wouldn't he open every egg he found?! (Only a couple ended up having Oreos. The rest had animal crackers and goldfish. And a few had stickers... boo! That was dad's idea! He loves them now. But at the time, "just stickers?!") :o) The eggs led out of the living room, down the hall, up the stairs, in to our room, and across the floor to his new wagon filled with goldfish, new sippy cups and sneakers, and several little toys.

The picture below was taken after we wiped off the Oreo scum from his lips.

Happy First Easter, bud! :)

EAMON IS ONE!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, EAMON!

It's hard to believe, but it's true. Our little boy is 1!

Though he is not much of a picky eater, Eamon's favorite is homemade macaroni and cheese. So, thats what we had for dinner (of course!). We had our friends Adam and Beth over for dinner, too. Afterwards, we wore party hats (Eamon's lasted all of 3 seconds before he snagged it right off!), sang Happy Birthday, and began dessert.

Eamon had never really had dessert before. At the time, he enjoyed watermelon and bananas and that was his dessert. So, when it was time for cupcakes with chocolate frosting, I knew he would devour what I put in front of him. Instead of overwhelming him with this decision (eat it all up quickly or savor every morsel... yeah right), I began to break off pieces for him. He sucked them down before I could break off another piece. So we gave him big chunks (well... like... the whole rest of the cupcake). He liked that. LOVED that. Then we decided to put our party hats back on and get a picture of Eamon in mid-first-cupcake.

He DIDN'T like that.

(Don't worry. After the picture was taken, we took off his hat and continued with the festivities!)

The year in review....

And summing up all of our thoughts of the past year (except those of our now neglected dog... what was her name again? Oh, yeah... Addy). :)

We love you, little man!

Tulip Festival

We are very lucky to live in such a beautiful part of the country. In the spring, it is gorgeous out here. The rain lasts through the winter, so the trees and grass stay green. But spring doesn't really hit until the flowers come. This year, we decided to splurge and spend the $5 to see the tulips. We couldn't have picked a better day. The weather was perfect. The sky was clear. The tulips were in full bloom.

And Eamon? Eamon was CRANKY!

We were lucky enough to get a few smiles out of him, though. After we conceded to letting him crawl in the dirt.

He also liked to rip off the petals. We didn't encourage that.

The flowers were beautiful. Rows and rows and rows of them. With Mt. Hood in the background. We'll still of it as a good time. Well, mommy and daddy will, at least. :)