Summer Fun!

We spent part of last week (Wednesday through Saturday) in Ocean City, New Jersey!  We had a wonderful time!  I took some super cute videos of Clark on the beach, but they are not uploading for some reason.  I will keep trying!  Here are some pictures:

Clark catching up on "Special Agent Oso" while Mama unpacked:

Beach bum:

Family pic! 

While we were there, Clark practiced his walking with cousin Josiah's walker!  He was much better on the carpet.  I took a short video: you'll notice Clark is a little testy about Aunt Abby helping him with the walker.  He was finicky the whole four days!  He would cry if I left the room, etc.  I'm sure he'll do better when we go down over Independence Day.  Here is the video:

Cousins at breakfast (Josiah is on the right; I think he was looking at Rufus, the dog!):

Philly skyline on the way home (don't worry, we were in a small traffic jam when I took the picture):

IN other news....Today Aunt Kim and I took Clark to Malvern, PA to get his One Year Pictures done by Picklepuss Photography!  The photographer, Mary, was absolutely wonderful!  Besides being super friendly and down-to-earth, she was excellent with Clark.  The poses she chose were great, and she did everything but stand on her head to get him to crack a smile!  That turned out to be the hardest part, actually.  Clark was in quite a serious mood this morning!  Mary assured me that she got some great shots, so I will rely on her expertise plus photoshop to make sure the pictures turn out. Haha :)  She is going on vacation next week so she said she'll have the proofs posted online this weekend!  Yay!  I'll send you all an email so you can look at them.

This was Clark at the shoot (Aunt Kim stole a pic on her phone!).  He is so serious!  I love the outfit though, I must say. :)

And he fell asleep on the way home!  Paci out, mouth wiiiide open, snoring, kind-of-sleep!

Looks sooo comfy, right?  I just love that carseat.  I would sit in one if they made one big enough!! :)  I will definitely try to post more often.  I will at least put up some pics every week.  Ta-ta for now!

Oh! To be One-Year-Old again!

Clark had a great weekend!  On Friday we went shopping with Mimi and Aunt Kim.  It was so nice.  We went to Macy's first, then Babies'R'Us, then Clark and I went home while they continued on.  It was so fun to see all of Aunt Kim's registry items at Babies'R'Us!  I've been borrowing this little "mini" boppy pillow from my friend for the past year (!!) so I finally bought my own.  My friend is having a baby in a couple months so she'll need hers back.  I use it to support my back when I'm in the glider in Clark's room.  And I used it every time I nursed Clark.  So it was worth the $15.  

This is Clark on our shopping trip: what a trooper!

Saturday morning Clark was up bright and early.  We went to the local Elverson Futbol Club's soccer games.  It was very fun!  I have many memories of watching those games with little Clark when he was only weeks old.  Let's just say I was much more comfortable this year.  He was in the swing, in his wagon, and playing in the grass.  Josh couldn't be a prouder father, pulling his little Clark around in that wagon. :)  We invited Aunt Kim and Uncle Jon over for lunch.  Then Jon helped Josh stain our back deck.  THANK YOU Uncle Jon!!!!!!  Aunt Kim and I took Clark on a walk then we watched the guys finish the deck.  

peas: his new favorite food

Sunday morning Clark was up early again.  Josh was the projectionist for the services so I took him to first service.  As we were walking into church, Clark was getting all clingy and weepy since he knew nursery was coming.  A very nice lady walked up to say, "hi" and Clark burst into tears!  I apologized profusely, saying he was having a bad day.  The lady commented, "Oh! to be one-year-old!  They have no idea how good they have it." Hahaha not a truer word was spoken!  The nursery was pretty empty, and as it turned out, some nursery volunteers had canceled so they were short some people.  I volunteered to stay for the second service.  I was nervous about how Clark would do with no nap since he had woken up so early, but no kids showed up for second service!  So Clark and I just went home.  Clark had a nice nap in the afternoon.  After he woke up, we all went swimming at Mimi's house!  It was a lot of fun!  Clark was squealing and splashing--he loooves water!  After about an hour or so we headed out to tidy up for church.  There was a special outdoor communion service that we didn't want to miss!  It was as a wonderful service.  Clark ended up being "kicked out" of nursery (Aunt Kim went inside to use the restroom and heard him wailing so she rescued those poor nursery volunteers!!).  After the service they served strawberries, shortcake and ice cream.  So we stayed for that since Clark was doing so well.  He had some of my shortcake and whipped cream.  For some reason he kept spitting out the strawberries!  By the time we got home, it was around 8:30pm.  

This is Clark messing around at the Strawberry Social:

This morning he woke up at 7:45am!  Yay!  I felt like a new person after all that sleep!  Today was very low-key.  Josh had to take the CRV to work since his car was being inspected.  So we stayed at home all day.  We went out for a walk, had a tickle fight, climbed up and down the stairs (did I mention Clark climbs the stairs now?? :) and made dinner.  I remember a funny story that happened around dinner time: 

Clark got this fun elephant toy for Christmas from Mom-mom and Pop-pop.  He always enjoyed playing with it.  In fact, he played with it so much that the batteries ran out.  Because they were special "D" size batteries, I tucked it away in my room until we purchased some.  A couple weeks went by and I replaced the batteries.  I placed the elephant in front of Clark and excitedly turned on the music--thinking he would jump for joy!  Instead he cowered in fear!  He was officially unnerved by the elephant.  What?!  So I've kept the elephant around his other toys to get him used to it.  

Fast forward to this afternoon.  I needed to occupy Clark while I started dinner.  I decided to give the elephant toy a try so I placed it in the middle of the kitchen while I chopped vegetables.  Clark cautiously peeked around into the kitchen for about five minutes.  Then he scooted in--making a wide circle around the elephant.  Then he stared at it and started yelling!  He would yell, then scoot, yell, scoot, until he made another circle around it.  It was so funny!!  I thought he was going to start chucking toys at it!  Anyway eventually he warmed up to it and started playing with it--until he accidentally turned on the music--then he scooted over to me, crying!  Clark, you are one crazy kid!

After dinner we went on another walk, climbed more stairs, gave Clark a bath, watched some Disney Junior--anything to push his bedtime later!  We got him to about 7:30pm before he was at his wit's end (laying on the floor with Mr. Monkey crying...poor guy!).  Here's hoping he sleeps until 7am!

Clark messing around after his nap today:

So I was also thinking about how Clark will often cross his eyes when I'm taking his picture.  For example:

 Actually, between the crossed eyes and the red icing he looks like a clown! Hahaha...sorry Clark!

Anyway as I was looking through some old baby photos....what should appear but a cross-eyed baby, ME!!!! Hahahahahahaha  Check it out:

There's no denying it!  Let's just hope he outgrows it, as I have....

Happy Birthday Kelsey Mae!!!!

Today Kelsey turned three!!!  Happy Birthday, Kelsey!!!  I remember the day she was born.  We were so excited to hear that she was a girl!!  She was the cutest little baby--perfect skin, big beautiful eyes!!  And now she's a cute little three-year-old!

Here she is with the lovely "star creature"--one of her favorite toys as a newborn:

I looove this picture of the Brust girls:

standing tall my lady!

hugs from big sis!

big, beautiful eyes!

bathing beauty in Hawaii:

admiring her big sis:

Kelsey Mae is quite the little lady these days.  She impressed us with both her spunk and her tender side (especially around the babies, Jay and Clark) on vacation two weeks ago.  We love you, Kelsey!!!

 

Two new teeth!

The last four days have been spent readjusting to life after vacation. :)  Clark has sprouted two new teeth (one bottom and one top) so he has been pretty cranky.  He also has a nasty cough.  In between the cuddle sessions and tylenol doses, he's been reconnecting with his toys.  He also tried on his souvenir: this "little shrimp" shirt:

I think it suits him. :)

On Sunday, Clark woke up at 5:30am crying.  I went upstairs and popped his paci and that held him off until 6:15am.  I pulled on a sweatsuit and socks and went back upstairs to get him.  On the way back down the steps, I slipped (I usually wear slippers with tread, not slippery socks) and fell on my back, while holding him.  We knocked heads, which bent my glasses and gave us both a headache!  I also bruised my elbow. :(  It was more scary than anything though.  I yelled for Josh to help because I couldn't get up, and then I ended up crying.  Clark was crying too (probably to make me feel better haha).  I ended up staying home from church with Clark because he had started coughing and his nose was really running.  I spent the day catching up on laundry and sorting through our beach stuff.  Clark took good naps and played happily with his toys!  And today was the day we spotted his second bottom tooth poking through!

I woke up really sore on Monday, so I figured that was from falling on Sunday morning.  Clark and I went to Grandma and Grandpa's house for lunch!  YUM!!  We had a wonderful time catching up!  After lunch we came home and Clark decided not to take an afternoon nap.  It was the weirdest thing!!  I read that sometimes toddlers his age skip naps or their naps become irregular, but I didn't expect my sick 12-mo-old to go 8 hours without sleeping!  Needless to say, I spent almost the entire afternoon (a good three hours) trying to get him to sleep/feeding him a bottle/rocking him/cuddling.  It was exhausting!  I was ready for a nap myself!  By 4:30 Clark was REALLY tired and cranky.  We held him off until 6pm and he fell right to sleep.  I went to the church congregational meeting that night, which lasted until 9:30pm!

By Tuesday I could tell he was definitely sick.  He woke up with his second bottom tooth poking through, red eyes, runny nose, and lots of coughing.  He woke up at 5:45am and I tried to hold him off but he wouldn't fall back to sleep.  I got him up, fed him breakfast, and by 7:00 he was sitting in the middle of his toys crying!  So back to bed he went!  He slept from 7-8am (I personally was hoping for longer...) then we started the day over again.  There's nothing like a fresh start! :)  We went to Aunt Kim's for lunch to see her new basement carpet.  It's beautiful!  We also "helped" her (I chased Clark around as Mom helped) move some of their office items into the basement closets.  Their office is going to be the baby's room!  Yay!  Clark fell asleep on the way home:

Clark slept about an hour and a half then he was done with that.  We played, went for a walk, and basically just killed time until Josh got home.  He barely ate any dinner.  This time we put him to bed at 6:30pm.  And holding him off that long was torture!  He was so tired!  Poor guy.  After he was in bed, I went to Walmart because we were running out of food!

Today Clark woke up bright and early again, 6am.  He couldn't stop coughing!  I figured he was hungry since he had hardly any dinner, then drank about 2 ounces or less before bed.  I gave him a bottle and pretended like he was a newborn.  He ended up falling back to sleep until 7:30!  Yay!  I had baking on the agenda for today so we started out by washing a ton of dishes (can't bake with full counters!!  how embarrassing...).  We had an early lunch because he woke up from his nap at 10:15 and we were both hungry by 11.  I tried to put him down for a nap around 12:30 because he was so cranky.  At 1:15 he fell asleep.  At 1:45 a lawnmower woke him up!!  Disappointing to say the least.  I had a big batch of cookies going...I was counting on him sleeping at least an hour.  Anyway, we survived.  He was standing so cute in his crib when I got him:

After awhile, Aunt Kim came over and we took a long walk.  It was so nice!!   Clark showed off some of his new tricks:  I'm trying to teach him to touch his nose.  So far he touches his ear, then will touch my nose.  We'll keep working on it!  Also, he is climbing the stairs, although he needs to be spotted the whole time.  He sometimes reverts back to leading with his feet (like when he scoots), so he falls backwards pretty often.

Right before Josh got home I was tickling Clark under the chin.  He threw his head back and I realized he has a top tooth coming in!!  No wonder he's so sad!  Poor guy!  His gums are all red at that spot.

Josh grilled again tonight for dinner.  We had sweet Italian sausage and sauteed peppers and onions.  It was delicious!  I had made baked sweet potatoes especially for Clark (delicious little cubes of sweet potatoes).  He promptly threw a couple on the floor.  I force-fed him one.  He threw up.  YUCK!  Then I gave in and he ate three bites of applesauce and five goldfish.  Then he refused to eat anymore.  I couldn't believe it!!  Oh well, teething?  Plus with all that coughing, who wants to eat?

We went for a walk after dinner to help stretch out Clark's bedtime.  It worked!  He made it to 7pm!  Hopefully he will wake up later.  I may give him milk in the morning again if he wakes up before 6am.  Waking up before 6am is just so depressing!!

I hope you're all having a great week!

P.S. Congrats to one of my college roommates, Megumi, on the birth of her son, Jinn!!!  He joins older sister, Hana.  He was born on Memorial Day!!!

Videos from Murrells

on the ride down:

eating Kelsey's birthday cake:

Family Vacation...Stoltzfus-style

Hey everyone!
  We just got back from a week-long Stoltzfus-side vacation in Murrells Inlet, South Carolina!  The trip down went very well.  We rolled into the driveway around 5:30pm on Saturday night.  We spent the whole week on the beach!  It was sooo relaxing!  Clark woke up super early most of the time so he ended up taking two naps each day.  He slept very well in his packnplay!  We went out to dinner on Thursday and Friday.  Wednesday was cloudy so the girls went shopping during the day.  But overall we had sunny, beautiful "beach days" (as we called them). :)  I didn't take a ton of pictures, so I will be getting some from my Mom.  But here's what I have from my camera:

Aunt Katelyn cuddling with Haley:

 Mimi and her "two little girls" :)

Aunt Rin and her cute little side-kicks

Josh's first catch of the week:

Vaca house (from the beach):

 Aunt Kim, the bearer of all things yummy, gives the girls a beach snack:

 Clark beaching:

 the boys:

 Daddy and Clark:

 Mommy and the two little boys:

Clark enjoying Kelsey's birthday cake:

We had devotions as a group every night, here is Clark on Daddy's lap during the singing:

Lounging with Daddy one afternoon:

 Clark and Jay out to eat on Thursday:

Silhouettes:

Mommy and Clark on the last day:

Don't ask, haha: