Shakin' What Her Mama Gave Her

I swear, I will be genuinely surprised if Genevieve doesn't end up auditioning for So You Think You Can Dance in 15 years.  This girl's got the hip action!

Holidays & Birthdays

We made the inaugural cottage trip Memorial Day weekend.  We went up on Saturday night after a looooooooong day at work for yours truly, and arrived in time for a little dessert and bed time.  The cottage has been in a state of transformation for about a year, with the addition of a huge new master bedroom, second bathroom, and lots of new storage space.  Having two full bathrooms with kids running around?  Priceless.

The weekend weather was terrific.  The water was still way too cold for any sane adult, but for the under-12 set who lack internal body temp regulation it was swim ready!

sea worthy

boo boo's first trip to the cottage and first time on the boat

he'll be cruising these bench seats by later this summer, just like sis did

sib chat

hi mummy!

the boys

daddy, i get you.  (ps - notice steve in the background filming the same lake he's filmed every weekend for the last two years)

aye aye cap'n!

1....2.....

3!

first dock leap of 2012

The next weekend we celebrated Matt's 32nd birthday.  Friday we went out to dinner with Shawn & Mel at one of Milwaukee's most famous restaurants, Karl Ratzsch's.  I had never been there but it was a German meat extravaganza, which I think is exactly what my hubs wanted for his birthday.  Less desirable was the waitress, Didi, who continued to serve us over our shoulders from behind our round booth.  She was like some kind of waitress ninja who we never saw coming.  A giant platter of over the shoulder sauerbraten can catch a gal off guard.  We brought the average age of the patrons down by about 40 years but it was a great meal and a classic MKE experience.

The next morning my pastry chef and I got busy baking up some birthday treats.

mom, i want to mix it myself

visions of a batter bomb going off in the kitchen

two hands makes mama feel better

the fine science of sprinkle placement

voila!

happy birthday!

let's chow!

baby's first frosting injury

Toothy Time

The kid is unimpressed by sloppy baby food which is ok as Lukas's chompers are starting to come in.  He'll be gnawing on steak in no time!

ta da

ok mom, they get it

I managed to get him in last week for his six (and a half) month appointment.  He came in at 17 lbs 4 oz and 28.5", the 50th and 97th percentiles respectively.  He's a lean, mean, toothy machine!

Family Photos

To make sure we are adequately capturing these bugaboos while they're little, we had a photographer, Natalie, come shoot the kids in April.  She lives and works in Appleton but was in town over Easter visiting her sister and my friend, Jessica.  The pics came out a lot better than I anticipated - both kids were really tired and I expected full melt down.  Luckily that didn't happen until about 25 minutes in to it so we got a few keepers!  Here are some of my favorites:

could absolutely eat those little curled toes

easily one of the best pictures matt has ever taken!

love this one.  it is so her

you can see lukas has started to check out here

winner winner chicken dinner!  this was immediately blown up to 8x10 and is already up on the wall

if this frame was slightly wider you would see a super tired and very pissy three year old sulking in the background.  super memories!

Mother's Day '12

My first Mother-of-Two's Day was absolutely perfect this year.  I got to sleep a smidge later than normal and was greeted with coffee and challah French Toast for breakfast.  Yum.  The weather was gorgeous and the kids were well behaved.  Matt usually plays baseball on Sundays but the teams collectively - and wisely - decided to cancel the games that day so our little family got to spend some relaxing time all together.  Which I think is probably the only thing that we mom types really want, no matter what day it is.

happy post-nap baby.  ps - he did not pull himself up, but is getting pretty solid on those little feet, yes?

hi mama

um, might be time to consider lowering the mattress

boo boo!

great day to grill out for lunch

gg giving boo some loves

a big squeeeeeeeeeze for everyone!

matt immediately after dropping his jalapeno brat on the deck.  sad face.

at the park

loves for daddy too!