Did someone say naked sparkling? It must be the 4th of July!

Hope your 4th turned out better than my very patriotic red velvet cupcakes....

Stay away from the whipped icing people. It's disaster in a plastic can. These were later crumbled into Bluebell for a nice save. We spent the day up at the Lake at my mom's cousin Stacie's gorgeous house. There were a ton of people there inlcuding lots of little kids and tons of teenagers and more cousins than you can count. Mom and Dad rented a jet ski and we took turns blasting around the lake. Guess you can add this to our list of stupid things to do with a six month old...

You can stop calling CPS now...no babies were harmed during the taking of this picture...Emmy did about 65 out there, jumping wakes and doing handstands... :) I made VERY slow turns (think 5 mph) but watch out on the straightaways becasue I hit the big 47!!! For those of you who know my driving skills you will be glad to know that jetskiing involves no stopping so we were all pretty safe =)

Emmy had her own swimming digs that she shared with her fourth (?) cousin Lucy.

We also solved the great mystery of why Emmy won't seem to eat her veggies anymore.

Hmmm, might it be that they just don't taste as good as sand tarts? OR coconut creme pie????

Emmy's Great-great-great- Aunt Ada Beth made her this beautiful quilt! What a spoiled little girl!

For a nice white trash ending, we topped off the day with a little naked sparkling!

Before you get too excited, the rest of us kept our clothes on. Thank goodness. These sparklers cost a big buck and we know why. L_A_M_E!!! Since when are sparklers metal? I don't remeber that. The fact that we did them in the 90 degree heat at 8:30 didn't help either. It gets dark too late for infant sparkling. They had a burn time of about .73 seconds and it was super windy, so we had to light them in the garage and then do a REALLY quick patriotic run to the flag two houses down the street to nab this awesome picture. You were required to sing "I'm proud to be an American" while you ran. You can see, Laura and Sean run faster than we do. All five of Blake's sparked out during the run.


If you were thinking of the song "Redneck Woman" while looking at this picture, it's okay. maybe we can add "I'll stand barefooted with lake hair, in my own front yard, with a naked sparkler box eating baby on my hip..." As usual, Emmy would've rather just had the box...

So we leave you with this little bit of Patriotism... pink and green clash slightly with red, but who cares! Watermelon and the 4th of July don't! Emmy says Happy birthday America!

Where Have We Gone...

Two week hiatus! Two week hiatus! It may as well been four weeks with the amount of things happening around here. In fact, over the last weekend, Collin, Betsy, Kristen and I took a kid free trip to Mexico. You heard it here first...no Caroline...no Bemmers...just the adults in Mexico. Emmy had an extended sleepover at GiGi and Pop's house, which she loved. She got to know some of her cousins better, as well as a great Aunt and Uncle and of course her very own Aunt and Uncle. She even had time to play with the dogs. She absolutely loves dogs! Of course, we won't mention all of the "fun" food items she gets when she goes for a vacay at the grandparents...Diet Coke, donut holes, mexican food...wait, those remind me of someone's very favorite foods and drink...I won't name names...

While sad, Kristen and I were able to get in Collin and Betsy's ride and go to the airport for our first trip away. By the way, great collaborative effort not to have Tim take us to the airport with the Bemmers in tow, that could have been a little hairy...Kristen only bawled once, very much the trooper. An hour and 50 minutes later we were in the Cancun airport. 45 minutes after that we were in our suites at the Valentin Imperial Maya. 20 minutes after that I had a drink and was sitting on a raft floating in the pool. Mexico really can be great.

If any of you are interested in going to Mexico, now may be the time. Low prices, basically deserted and great weather...well at least most of the time...we had a blast! From the rollin surf and boogey boardin to the Texas Hold'em to the relaxin by the pool, it was a vacation that the four of us all enjoyed.



Kristen and I were even able to scratch something else off the life to do list. Sunday morning we got up, 5:30 am to be exact, and boarded a bus for XCarat. There we did something that I know my baby has been wanting to do for some time, swim with the Dolphins...Now, the weather was not ideal, overcast, raining on and off...but the Dolphins were plentiful! Kristen and I had our pictures taken with a dolphon kissing each of us, petting the dolphin and holding its fins. We evern had the chance to be pushed through the water by a pair of dolphins. "Pushed through the water by dolphins?" you may be asking...think the original Jaws, when the girl is being attacked by the great white and she is being tossed through the water by the buoy only to be eaten shortly there after. Just like that, without the blood and guts portion at the end...We wanted all the pics and the video, but at $25 bucks per pic we could only afford a pair, so feast your eyes on $50 worth of picture amazement and wonder.


We did make it back to the states, and we did get our Bemmers back. She has quite the personality now, but that is the subject of another post on another day. Before we left she had been trying desperately to crawl and stand up on her own. Well, she's still working on the crawling but standing up is no longer a problem, and sitting down all day is not an option.

Since we came home from Mexico she also has started talking more and more. Daddy is ecstatic with the new progress...I think everyone will recognize what she is saying...

6 Months!

It's the big 6 month picture shoot! I started to think that maybe I needed to do something special for the 6 month one because everybody does. Then I realized that most people aren't obsessive and don't go take pictures every month. We did these at 4:30 Sunday after a LOOOONG weekend full of driving all over the place and no naps, so she did pretty well. The photographer was just "eh". Think I'm back to Portrait Innovations. She was in open mouth mode. She was channeling her cousin abby's signature pose... =)

Our 100th Post!

So Blake and I have been talking about our hundreth post for about a week now and planned out a cool Top 10 list with our favorite pictures of the few years with witty captions and timelines..... yeah, we're WAY too tired to do a cool Top 10 list with witty captions.... besides we all know what #1 would be anyway...

Here's out #1 on her 1/2 year birthday! I thought mini-cupcakes would be fun since she's so big now (and this cupcake thing is getting expensive). Mini Cupcake juuuuust fit into mini-hands... I can't wait for the panicked call from daycare tomorrow about the smurf poo.....

I'm Thinking Emmy Doesn't like Mac and Cheese...

Many things are changing these days. Emmy has become more and more aware of Kristen and I, especially when we think she is being funny. Like the first time she decided to do this...

Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner will never ever be the same...Thanks Caroline!

Jackson is Here!

Jackson Keith Borchardt

3:57 pm 6 lbs 12 oz

We got there just in time to sneak a few pics and see him before they took him off to the nursery. We didn't even get to hold him. BOOOOOO.....Emmy is very proud that now she's the "Big" cousin. Everyone is doing fine! Hopefully more pics tomorrow.....

Jumparoo!

Dad finally got tired of half the living room being taken over by my toys, so he sneakily took down the swing while Mom and I were gone one day.

Emmy would smile when she even saw the swing, so I was pretty upset that her happy place was gone. Never mind that her feet hung off the bottom of it by a good five or six inches. Well, we brought down the Jumparoo from upstairs and WOAH, we didn't know what we were in for!

Laura just happened to be over right when she first discovered how to do it. It wasn't so much jumping as it was a happy dance. She's always been a Riverdancer, and this just enhances her already fantiastic riverdancing ability.

Now she won't stop jumping. She jumps when she stands up, she jumps against your legs while she's eating, she tries to jump while she's laying down. It's all the time! She even jumps on the top of the Jumparoo before you get her in there. This is a pretty tame version on the video. It's usually wild woman crazy jumping. But as usual, she won't do it when we've got the camera rolling...of course...please ignore my nasty bruised white legs. It's been a while since I've seen the sun.

All this jumping must be good for the legs becasue Emmy is now pulling up on your fingers and then thinks she big enough to let go and walk away. Luckily she doesn't mind too much when she faceplants. She's even holding on to the ottoman and "Tanning UP" by herself. She's REALLY proud of herself when she does it.

Grandmothers are the Best!

Just to show she does not play favorites and to let Lannie know that she is important to her, just like GiGi, Emmy did the unthinkable yet again.

I don't know what my favorite part of this picture is, the fact that my Mom got pooped on (see the dribble on the bottom of her shirt) or the look on Emmy's face. I think she may have some more where that came from.

Oh wait! I forgot to mention that the mess made it out of her pants and onto the floor at Megan's house. Fantastic!

Another priceless moment in the life of my little girl!

A Day in the Country

One of Kristen's long time friends, Lauren and her husband Ryan live in Fannett, Texas. For those of you that read this that have no idea where that is, take I-10 East from Houston to 73 to 146...wind around on some back roads and BAM...Fannett! You can't miss it! Kristen, Emmy, Collin, Betsy, Caroline and I loaded into the Tahoe and headed to a house warming party for the Richard's (REE-Shards). One note, if you plan on going, make sure you don't take the "back way"...Collin lead us to a dead end, a downed bridge over troubled water left over from good old Hurricane Ike. We had a bit of back-tracking, but found the way courtesy of Kristen's ever so reliable Iphone. If you don't have an Iphone, I highly recommend one...they can be very helpful in some very tight situations.

Lauren and Ryan have a great place. A large piece of property with a house, a garage that has been converted into an outdoor living space, a shop/garage, a horse stable, a covered porch and a pond complete with hundreds of catfish, a three foot alligator Kristen named Lloyd and two sprinklers that Ryan had so aptly named "s**t spitters". They also have 4-wheelers and plenty of room to roam, so of course, I loved it.

To kick off their lives in their new digs Ryan purchased and cooked 400 pounds of crawfish. 400! In retrospect, Ryan confided that he should have cut it off at 300, but the additional 100 was just to good to pass up. We ate many and then tried to help Ryan peel the rest so that he and Lauren could use them later in other recipes. Ryan...how late did you stay up Saturday night? Hope some of your boys ended up helping you...

The Hap Hap Happy Family by the Pond

"Caroline, I don't care how old you are..."

My baby girl with the Hostess

The Ladies

MOTORBOAT!

"Yes, I've been eating...eating gooooooooood!"

Classic Caroline

A little Father/Daughter Time

"This is one of my favorite ways to sit now...Daddy likes it too. I heard him saying something about a good workout. Daddy, you're my dumbell, I'm not yours. Now dance Monkey!"

Daddy was very happy I can already do this...

"Riding Horses ain't no big thing."

"Dad, never turn your nose up again at my turkey and sweet potato mash."

"Formula is different in the country."

Kristen, Emmy and I appreciated that hospitality and look forward to a return trip to the country. Ryan already told me that I have much to learn...

The Five Month Photo Shoot

The Diva wouldn't sit up and smile at the same time. They're stil pretty cute though! The giant panda is one of the first things that Blake bought when we found out we were having a baby. It was sitting alone in Emmy's room for a long time =)

(About to take a tumble)