My Chaos -

Every year since Bryan was born it has been a requirement to take a picture with the monkey statues at the zoo. Now Joshua is participating. The monekey's have been in our albums for 7 years now. I never get tired of seeing Bryan pose with them as if they were his long time friends.

A picture of both the boys together at our yearly trip to the zoo and they both look cute! It was REALLY hot outside, but as usual we had a great family outing and everyone had a blast. We even ended the day with no melt downs, no arguing and everyone still liked everyone else. :)

It's a battle. Both are armed with Light Sabers. If one lets down his guard the other one will surely pop him in the head! It's been known to happen. Bryan tries to be gentle with his little brother, but Joshua has yet to learn that concept. As soon as Bryan looks the other way, Joshua WILL take a swing of the sword at him and it will all end in a melt down of tears and I'm sorry's. The sight of Joshua rubbing Bryan's head and asking if he's OK inevitably brings forth a smile from big brother Bryan.

The boys got new matching chairs for Bryan's birthday. We retired Bryan's reclyner for good. You would think that since the chairs are exactly the same the boys wouldn't be able to fight over them, but they still manage to label which one is "theirs" and fight over who is closest to the table. UGH!

First Bryan gets ready, then he blows his candles out and then.... Joshua errupts! He was so upset at Bryan for blowing the candles out. I think he wanted to help! It was real gut-wrenching sob and took a few minutes to console him. :)

My parents in Benin. I miss them sooooo much and can't wait for them to come home, even if it won't be for good. They look wonderful! I'm so glad they are doing the thing they have talked about for so many years!

These are 2 of the 5 million attempts at taking 18 months portraits of Joshua and of course big brother too. I try to instill some sense of family traditions such as portraits. The boys seems to enjoy it (at least for the first 2 million shots). I hope they look back at it with fondness and not one more of those silly things mom made us do. I love photography and try to improve at it with the limited time I have to devote to it. Until I'm a master, my boys will have to endure trillions of photos of them with their dad hanging out on the side ready to put them back into the right pose or move my light disk a certain way to get that perfect picture. :)

Bryan completes a full week of standardized testing today. I really hope he did well. He is a really intelligent boy, but gets bored quickly when it comes to proving it. So, cross your fingers that the results are awesome!!!

Joshua adores his brother and I know Bryan would go to any length to keep his brother safe. They may have their moments when their sole goal in life is to irritate the crap out of each other, but when they play together, they really play well! Joshua is quickly trying to catch up to all of the cool things his big brother can do and Bryan is a more than willing teacher. Trust me! Every day Joshua seems to pick up on those annoying habits of Bryan's - such as living room acrobatics! Grrrrr....

Joshua went to his very first movie over the summer. We went to see Madagascar. He had a blast and loved the gummy bears we bought him to snack on! He danced away to the song "Move It, Move It" and then promptly passed out for the remainder of the movie. He may have slept through a chunk of the movie, but he behaved beautifully. No running around or crying at all! I was very proud of him.

NOOOO!!! Not from fighting, but from an accident involving a much sought after toy at daycare over the summer. Apparently Bryan and another kid wanted to play with the same toy. The other boy decided to give in, but didn't let Bryan know before he just let go. The result was Bryan getting smacked in the face with the toy in his own hands. I couldn't let the moment go by without documenting his very first black eye. ;)

Tuesday nights are family night in our house. This particular week we chose to play a game called Ticket for a Ride. Since Joshua is still too little to play board games we thought we could pacify him with his rocking chair, a bottle and Harry Potter. However, he had another plan! He decided, strapped in or not, he was going to get to that board game and play! He rocked and rocker until he was leaning forward enough to reach the floor, then he walked, rocking chair and all, to the table where we were playing! You can't say that he isn't persistent! :)

This is Bryan's dog, Max. We adopted him from the North Texas Great Dane Rescue. There was a time not long after we got him when we considered returning him due to some bad habits he came to us with. I'm glad now that we didn't. He has finally adjusted to our family and hates being apart from Bryan. The feeling is definately mutual. Bryan loves him so much and does a great job taking care of him. Max even sleeps in Bryan's room with him and night and cries if he is outside too long without his boy.

We just bought Joshua his very own Potty! He isn't quite ready for it and won't go near it without a diaper on, but he loves to use it as a chair in the middle of a living room. We are going to start trying to get him to warm up to the idea of using it. Big Brother Bryan will need to pitch in and show him how it's done! LOL! Especially since Bryan was quite irritated that he didn't have HIS own new potty! (not that he will use his very own bathroom that is connected to his bedroom) I have resorted to making it a requirement that he use HIS bathroom at least once a day. hehe!

Brandon giving the boys a ride around the living room... Bryan wasn't going to stand by and let Joshua have all the fun! Brandon was pretty worn out after all of that. After all Joshua is only 10 pounds lighter than Bryan! Plus they were holding on for dear life! :)

This picture is just for Papi since I know it will gross him out...eeeewwww!

We saw the first graders last year with the construction hats on. Bryan was really excited that he was part of the class that got to wear them this year! It was really cute because the boys had no problem wearing and playing with them, but most of the girls didn't want to put them on their heads and risk messing up their hair - especially on the first day....

Bryan has been in school for 3 weeks now. He is having a great time in first grade and doing pretty well. He is loving the fact that he is a "veteran" student and knows his way around and what is expected of him. First Grade comes with a LOT of homework and tests and we've all come to realize that it is going to require a lot more effort on all of our parts to keep him ahead of the pack. They have mixed up what were the two Kinder. classes, so some of his friends are in his class and some are from the other K class from last year. It's great since he will get to know a lot more kids in his year.

Just testing to see if it's working...