Boys and their bottles

I guess there's some things that never change!

Happy Birthday Dad/Grandpa!

Want to send an extra special birthday shout out to my Dad!



Wish I could give you a big hug myself today!

We love you! Have a wonderful day!

A day at the park

The nasty heat and humidity that is summer in Tokyo appears to finally be behind us. Yay! I survived my third (and last) Tokyo summer! We've been taking advantage of the recent fantastic weather by spending the last few afternoons at a local park. Here's some pictures from this afternoon:

Connor scoping out the park scene:

Sloan being her usual unbelievably cute self. Is she for real?

The girls sitting nicely, Connor off on his own, investigating something...

Babies sharing secrets. I love Sloan's hand on Connor's back!

Finally a fan of the swing!

FANatic

I've mentioned before that I'm super lucky that Connor is such an excellent sleeper- whew! When he's awake he's going 150 miles an hour but when its time to sleep the kid really crashes! I'm convinced there's 2 key things that play a big part in this:

1 - The stuffed dog that lives in his crib that I've mentioned before. Andrew and I jokingly (just between us) refer to this dog as "Crackpuppy" because he's straight up addicted. He can't get his hands on him fast enough. He also knows that when he sees Puppy, its about to be lights out. I don't let him have Puppy except in his crib. Once we were playing in his room and he saw Puppy through the bars of his crib. He quickly pulled him out of the crib, and then laid down on the floor of his room and closed his eyes (something Connor would never normally do)! So for Connor, Puppy = Sleep. Most of the time Connor even sleeps with one of Puppy's ears or tail in his mouth (I know, I know- so weird). I'm thinking of taking out a life insurance policy on Puppy- because if something ever were to happen to him I'm convinced none of us would sleep again.

2- The second- is the white noise/fan thing. As I've also mentioned, Connor MUST sleep with a fan. And not only does he have to sleep with a fan in the room, but likes to have his head as close as physically possible to it. This really cracks me up. No matter where we put Connor in his crib, he takes Puppy in his mouth and crawls over to the corner of the crib that allows his head to be closest to the fan! This is where he'll sleep all night. He comes by it honestly- one of the funnier experiences Andrew and I had when we first moved to Tokyo was going to Akihabara (the electronics district) to shop for a fan for our bedroom. All of the fans were sitting out on the ground and there Andrew and I were, down on our hands and knees, trying to listen to the fans. The Japanese clerk saw what we were doing and came over to us, pointing out a new "super quiet!" fan they were selling. Andrew and I attempted to explain that no, no- we were actually looking for the LOUDEST fan they sold. He thought we were nuts. So I can't really blame Connor for being the way he is!


Side note: Andrew says I am absolutely insane to take pictures of him while he is sleeping, for fear that he could so easily wake up but I just can't resist!

Pics from the Weekend

On Friday night Andrew and I got a babysitter and went out for dinner. Afterwards we met up with some friends and not surprisingly, ended up at our favorite karaoke joint.


Horsing around with Connor on Saturday morning:

Happy Guy

Connor's favorite toy (besides his stacking cups of course) is still a good old cardboard box. I didn't get a picture of it, but he really loves to push it around the room too.

Wednesday afternoon

Here's some random pictures I took of Connor this past Wednesday (my Mom called this morning to harrass me for some new pictures since its been over week :)

Meal time is his favorite time!


He'll smile on demand, but will keep sucking his thumb while doing so.


Caught emptying the contents of my diaper bag.


Planning his escape.


Connor likes to turn the pages of the book himself when we read. Here he is "reading" on his own. Thanks for the book Aunt Jackie!


Isn't he so grown up?!