The Iowa State Fair (because Brian said we HAD to go)

I'm not really a huge fan of the Iowa State Fair (I don't really hate it; I just could do without it), but Brian insisted that we go and take Max with us. We went on a Tuesday evening and happened to get lucky because the weather was cool (I've been to many a state fair where the temperature was well over 100 degrees), and since it had rained all day the crowds were light. Max had fun people watching (although he had already been to the fair with Grandma Nancy and Grandpa Tom earlier in the week, so he was really a fair pro by this point) and, just as Brain predicted, Max LOVED the animal barns. Oh, and I was happy because this year I upgraded from a cup of cookies to a BUCKET of cookies. Yeah. That's right. And they were goooood.

His favorite thing was this particular pig. He thought the snorting noises were funny, and he really liked that the pig seemed to actually acknowledge his presence.


Taking a closer look at the pig.


The Pig. :)


Max, looking calm (and obviously cute) while waiting to be put back in the car on the way home. As always, my pictures are out of sequence.


Brian and Max getting ready to go down the big slide. (They're the ones standing next to the slide worker. Clearly they beat the crowd walking up the stairs!)


Going down the slide. Both Max and Brian were having neither a good or bad time at this point. Max was totally confused as to what was going on, and Brian was trying to stop from going the seemingly 497 miles per hour that he thought they were going.


Seconds after the first, big slide ride. Max is still confused. :)


We happened to see Heather's brother and sister-in-law right in front of the big slide, so we asked them to take a quick family picture for us. I'm impressed, because Max is actually sort of smiling. Usually he looks semi-distressed in our family pictures.


Brian disappeared to get food for several minutes, so I spent my time taking picture after picture of Max. This is one of those dozens. :)

Eating Adventures

Now that Max can feed himself, he's had some pretty spectacular meal moments. I don't typically have the camera on hand, but here are a few times when I did.

This picture doesn't illustrate it too well, but if you look closely you can see that Max's hair is sticking up and out in several places. This is because he was eating pears, sticking his hands in his hair, eating some more pears, sticking his hands in his hair again, etc. For some reason unknown to me, he thought that this was all very hilarious.


The following four pictures show one of Max's first attempts with silverware. I don't mean to ruin the ending, but he failed miserably. :)

This is him trying to put the fork in his mouth, which was good, but due to his "technique" any food that he had on the fork had long since fallen off by the time he actually reached his mouth.


Here he's enjoying the attention from Grandma Kathy.


Another time where he did get the fork to his mouth, but there was still no trace of food on the utensil.


Finally he resorted to eating with one hand and holding the fork with the other. It was well played, in my opinion. :)

Cory and Heather's wedding

These pictures are all out of order. Sorry!

Max eating a piece of the wedding cake.


Standing in line for the dollar dance with his Aunt Heather.


Dancing with his Aunt Heather.


Near the end of the night, when he (clearly) was wedding-ed out.




Pictures before the wedding. You can't tell because it's zoomed in, but Max was looking up at his Uncle Cory for what I can only assume was some reassurance. He was a little uneasy about being up with a big group of fancy dressed people.


Proof that he just might be the world's cutest ringbearer.


A family picture. Pretend that Max is smiling and happy in this picture.


Grandpa Pete, Max, and Brian.


I love this one because he looks like such a little boy (as opposed to a baby).


Max and his Grandma Kathy.


Uncle Cory and Max.


Uncle Cory, Max, and Brian.


Max and Drew, the other ringbearer.


The wedding party.

Max's Birthday Party, Round 1

Since Max's actual birthday fell during vacation at Wildwood, we decided to have a very small and informal party for him. Since I'm quite possibly one of the least domesticated mom's ever, I decided to go with the very unimpressive cupcake birthday dessert. Cousin Atticus was the designated sprinkle applicator, and he did a stellar job. (He even accidentally decorated the floor for the party!) :)




Grandpa Tom, Grandma Nancy, Uncle Brad, Aunt Sarah, Bekah (Sarah's sister, who we've decided is my sister-in-law-law), cousins Atticus & Dietrich, Great (aka Grand) Aunt Linda, and the Dane family (Bill, Annette, Dennis, and Shannon) all attended the party. We were all happy to see that Max made the classic messy birthday cake photo ops plenty!

oh wow. it's been awhile since my last blog.

So, it's officially been a year since Max was born. Well, no, that's a lie. In 2 hours and some minutes (I'm way too lazy to do math right now), it will be an official year. I knew it would go by fast, but I didn't expect it to be quite this speedy. I can't decide if that's a wonderful thing or a sad thing, but seeing as how each day gets happier and Max gets cuter, I'll go ahead and say that I'm okay with it. Either way, time's just going to keep going by, so I might as well embrace it, right?

We're currently at Wildwood in Grand Rapids, MN. It's Max's first trip to the lake, and when I take the time to reflect, it seems pretty amazing that 27 years ago, I was here doing the same thing that Max is. Maybe I'll try to find a picture of that when I get home so that we can compare. For now, just the current ones will have to do: