Happy Fourth Birthday Link!

So it is kind of crazy, but Link turned 4 years old today. He had a great day. He got to do everything he wanted to do and, better yet, he got all the presents he was hoping to get!

I will post a whole album tonight or tomorrow, but I wanted to post this quickly before I go work on some stuff at the rental.

We decided to take Link to the cider mill after school today and as I was taking some pictures, I realized that this all seemed too familiar.

Here is a "then and now" comparison...

Then:

From Archive

Now:

From Lincoln 4th Birthday

This is no baby boy anymore! He loves school, he learns all sorts of new things everyday and he comes home with stories about all sorts of things.

I can't leave Lenore out of this. She got her first haircut today because her little mullet was getting a bit scraggly. Here is a picture of her with her new do:

From Lincoln 4th Birthday

She loves those donuts just as much as her brother. She's about 5 months older now than he was in the first picture here, but there is definitely some resemblance:

From Lincoln 4th Birthday

Pretty hilarious little creatures we have here. Happy Birthday Lincoln!

Lincoln starts school next week!

The last post was all Lenore, so this one has to be all Lincoln.

It is kind of hard to believe I've kept a blog running for more than 4 years. I started this for him and now we have 2 and a couple of houses and all sorts of other stuff has happened...my oh my.

Lincoln starts preschool at Ferndale Montessori on Tuesday, Sept. 3. One week from today! He is super excited. We have been school clothes shopping with him the last couple of weeks as well as getting him a little backpack and some other school supplies. He will only be doing afternoons for about 3 hours, but he will be there everyday. It is going to be a pretty big adjustment for all of us. Gena is already crying every time we talk about it and she doesn't know what she is going to do without him around for a few hours each day. He tells her that she will be fine and he will come home and tell her everything he learned.

We have been working hard with him lately and he is doing quite well with colors and counting. I'm not sure what will be required of him immediately, but I think we have him well prepared. Tomorrow morning we go in for his orientation. This isn't the first time we have visited the school, but this will be the first time since enrolling him in the program and he will be fully included in the hour long orientation. If it isn't raining (which doesn't seem likely) we will ride the bikes up. I'm excited for him, but this whole thing is totally surreal. I'm not sure what I expected when we had kids, but for some reason I'm still in shock that Link has survived this long. I guess I never understood the permanence f children because we only ever had fish or hamsters growing up and those things are relatively short-lived...you don't like your fish, wait a month, they'll be dead and you can flush them. No so much with kids...

Other than that, he has been helping me with projects around the house and cleaning occasionally. He rode the tube at the lake again this summer and actually had fun. He fell off once with Gena, so he won't ride with her anymore, but he still rides with me and has a blast.

I'll be sure to take plenty of pictures in the coming week of his first day at school and post them here.

More videos and some kinda new pictures

I uploaded a couple more videos to the Vimeo page. Here are your embedded links:

Watch carefully in this video of when we went blueberry picking. Lenore puts the berry in her mouth, but doesn't eat it...


Blueberry dispenser from Lucas Harrison-Zdenek on Vimeo.

This second video was from the park. Lenny wasn't terribly fond of the baby swings when she was smaller, but this time she totally loved it. Her friend Delilah did not...


Actually enjoying the swing from Lucas Harrison-Zdenek on Vimeo.

I also uploaded a few more pictures taken for Lenore's first birthday. We never got around to getting prints done before the party, so pretty much no one has seen these. Our good friend Melissa Labadie took these for us.

From Lenore One Year

From Lenore One Year

Follow the album link below the image for more...

Days go by

So we have just burned through the summer. I mean BURNED through. We bought another house to rent out and I've spent huge amounts of time over there.

Lenore is walking now. Check it:



Guess who can walk... from Lucas Harrison-Zdenek on Vimeo.

I'm almost done with my permaculture course, which means I'll be opening my business in the next three months and hopefully I will get some opportunity to design before cold weather comes through.

Lincoln starts preschool on September 3rd. He is going to Ferndale Montessori for his first year. He is excited, Gena is already crying...

I'll post more with pictures later. Just wanted to get a quick update in before I go outside to work on some more stuff.

The months just keep slipping by

We have been crazy busy lately. We are really starting to get involved with the new business stuff that will hopefully sustain us in the future. Lincoln and Lenore have been busy too. With all the nice weather we have had this month so far, we have spent as much time out of doors as possible.

I'm posting a few new pictures in the album to the right. Lenore's birthday is coming up so we took some "one year pictures" at a park near our house recently. She certainly is getting bigger. I'll be making a new album for those images and you can take a look at them here.

Here are a couple of our favorites:

From Lenore One Year

From Lenore One Year

What a cutie! Just like her brother at that age. I overestimated her ambition and said in the last post that I thought she would definitely be walking by her birthday. She does walk around the furniture holding on...very tightly...but she won't quite be there on her own by Saturday. Link walked around 15 months, so she has some time if she wants to beat brother.

Hmmm...what else? Lincoln is having a blast in the nice weather so far. He is the perfect size for his water table this year and plays with it every chance he gets. We have gone on several bike rides already and he can even ride his big wheel this year! He also talks to us like a full grown kid now. It's kind of hard to believe he ever just babbled with the vocabulary he has now. 

Lenore can separate her sounds now as well. She says "da-da" "ma-ma" "ba-ba" and a little bit of "uh-oh". Her "ba" sound means ball usually. She also knows what shaking your head means when you want to tell someone "no" and she gives kisses now. I will attempt to get all of this on video an post it here when I am able. 

In the meantime, enjoy the beautiful weather coming up and know that we will be as well.

How did I ever think I was busy before kids?

As it is, I am typing this post with one hand because I have a baby in my other arm.

I remember a time before I was married, or at least before I had kids, when I would say "I never have any spare time." What was I THINKING??!!

I have uploaded some new pictures to the web albums. We have been doing so much this year, it is going to be hard for me to explain it all. We have gone through quite a few things in the past few months. Some difficult decisions have been made but we are feeling very optimistic about the future.

With spring on the way, I have been gearing up for all the gardening and outside work that is coming and I have a new business idea that I will hopefully be setting up this summer. I am doing a lot of reading and plan on doing a lot of hands on training in the coming months.

Gena has also been working on a little business recently. Between her talents with sewing, knitting and the like, as well as he ability to learn quickly and her interest in getting into baking and cooking more, she has plenty of options on which way she wants to go.

Lincoln and Lenore are looking forward to summer just as much as we are. We got Link some new shoes with velcro on them and he is able to put them on all by himself. He is also learning how to dress himself in the morning and he has been out of diapers for months. We also quit using pull-ups at night about 3 weeks ago and so far we have had no accidents! He is going to preschool in the fall and I keep telling him that the teachers won't help him pull his pants up or put his shoes on, so he has to learn on his own. He's been doing great.

Lenore is crawling like a maniac now. She moves so fast. She also pulls herself up on the couches and pretty much anything else that will hold her. I have a feeling she will be walking before her birthday, but we will see. She is definitely getting big now. She talks to us and tries to tell us stories all the time. Those two little bottom teeth she got around Christmas and New years haven't been joined by any friends yet. Lenore eats some baby food, but without all those teeth she doesn't munch on anything quite yet.

Check the slideshow at the right for the new images. I'll post some video this week if I don't forget.