Not a rumpus!

The better Nikolai's language gets, the funnier he gets. Last night he was being a pain in the rear, so I told him to stop being such a pain in the rumpus. Nikolai got very upset and yelled, "I not a rumpus, I Nikolai Humphrey!" He said his name so perfectly and the whole statement with such conviction that I laughed hysterically and had to sit down on the stairs so I wouldn't fall over!

He is also starting to notice details, and sometimes is such a charmer. This morning as we were walking into daycare, he said, "I like you necklace. It shiny." Awww....

Swing Set!

So this picture doesn't have anything to do with the swing set, its just a cute picture of Julian.
Many thanks to Bill who supplied tools and knowledge and back power
And here it is after the first big rain and wind storm, glad we got those stakes in the ground.

Growing Boys

Despite our directions to not let the boys get any older while we were Ireland Bill and Maureen let them grow up.  Julian has begun to crawl on his knees, eat everything in site and push things around the house.  Niko has added two words to every sentence.   It has been a total surprise to get back and hear how articulate he has become in just one week.  
This is from a few weeks ago, Niko poured a bowl of cheerios on the ground and Julian pounced on them.  Being the good parents that we are we let them eat them off the floor.
Niko is getting taller, even without the heels.  Sarah had to go buy him (and Julian) new clothes for summer.

Walking in Howth

"We are walking where John?"
"Just around the bend there...
And past the huge rock in the ocean...
and past the cliffs...
and then we'll rest a little and go back."

St. Paddy's Day in Dublin

We picked this pub as our base of operations for the parade 
The streets got packed, this went on for about 2 and 1/2 miles, there were about 650,000 people there.  A lot of people come from all over the world for the parade, one Irishman told us in Galway that "there won't be a lot of Irish there."
Here is one of the floats.  The parade is very international with entries from all over the world.
John and Sarah 
Me and Sarah taking a break from the Parade,  we lucked out and snared some seats near the front window of the pub.

The Aran Islands

Here is a look directly over the cliff, can't take credit for this, those are Heather's feet.
Sarah by the cliff.

There was an old fort that backed up to this cliff.  There wasn't a fence or railing or anything. You could hang your feet off the side or look straight over the side.  I did neither.
Sarah, Me, Mike and Heather on one of the "beaches" on the Aran Islands
Here is a close up of the rock walls
the Aran Islands and a lot of eastern Ireland are covered in these rock walls, no mortor or nothing, they are just stacked one on top of the other

Nikolai is Coming; Baby Julian is Crawling!

First of all, a story so sweet that Santa couldn't possibly overlook this toddler.....
Last night Julian was on the floor playing and I was filling the washing machine. He started crying, and I heard Nikolai saying "Nikolai is coming," in the sweetest little sing-song voice. I watched from around the corner in the kitchen as Niko put a bunch of his cars on a tray and carried them over to Julian to share and play so that he would stop crying! It was enough to make a mom's heart melt.

AND, prior to this, Julian was doing a combat crawl, pushing himself across the wood floors to reach toys that had rolled out of reach (Ok, I moved the toys out of reach when I realized he had attained forward motion so that I could videotape)! This morning, he even got his belly off the ground for a bit when he crawled across the bed to me after being changed. A whole new window has opened up ... in the past week he has also started sitting up by himself for several minutes without falling over and feeding himself little babyfood puffs. He is changing every day! He also goes into bonafide giggle fits when tickled or teased.