Football Love

I understand that most little boys like balls, even footballs. But Dax LOVES football. Every night as soon as his Dad walks in the door he runs to find a football and tosses it back and forth with his Dad to his content (mind you, at this point I've spent the majority of my day also throwing the football with him). Then before bed, Dax's routine is to watch Sports Center or Football on TV for 20 minutes on Dad's lap (I think it's super cute, except for the other night when Curtis was out and I couldn't find Football on any of the channels- Dax was furious).

Curtis is coaching middle school football again this year with his brother, Morgan. Dax and I ventured out to their first game, Dax was exstatic and talked about football the whole day. He insisted on bringing his own football to the game and at every opportunity tried to sneak out onto the field with the big boys, telling me "Go, Football, Please??".

Dax LOVED cheering and clapping for every play of the game. Here he is yelling "C'mon, C'mon, GO! Yay!" Which he did for most of the hour and a half game. (He must take after his Grandpa yelling at football games- I've never heard Curtis yell this loud at a game!)

At the end of the game I let him stand a little on the field so he could watch Daddy's huddle a little closer, he has no idea he is not as big as they are.

Dax and Dad and another cheese-face.

Today we went over to Purdue for a football pep rally and picnic.

Dax wasn't interested in Purdue Pete.

But he was a better sport meet-and-greeting with the football players.

Curtis mentors this player named, Dan.

I knew that having a son with Curtis meant he would like football, but this little boy talks about football and plays football all day. I underestimated how soon the love of football would be passed on, 19 months was a little younger than I planned. But it is a welcomed obsession in our home. We all love football.

Indiana storm

Tonight, Dax was fast asleep so Curtis and I sat outside and watched this storm roll in. 

Oh, Bear.

This is Dax's most prized possession, his bear. 

This bear blanket goes everywhere Dax goes and no one can sleep in the house unless Dax has him in hand. 

Bear is family these days.

Brother Hugs

This afternoon Dax needed some extra snuggles and loving after his afternoon nap. Even though my belly and his baby brother are quite large these days, Dax finds a way to snuggle us both.

I love my sweet Dax. I hope his baby brother loves to snuggle Mama, too!

Back to School

Curtis started Back to School again today. Oh we will miss him after being spoiled by seeing him so much this Summer. This is his last year of School for his Master's Degree, starting this year we are officially on the job market. Wish us all luck!

(2011, Dax was still sleeping)

I grew up having a mandatory first day of school photo taken every year and I make Curtis pose every year. I never posted last year's photo so here it is... 

(2010, First day of Grad School)

A while ago I was talking to my 8 year old nephew Ethan who asked "What exactly does Curtis do for a living?". I answered that he was still in school. He was shocked and asked "Still?! Did he get held back or something?".

We are grateful that he did't get held back, but is still in school to move our family forward.

We are so proud of him. 

Daddy's buddy

On a busy Saturday afternoon I looked outside to see these two buddies taking a short break and talking about the cars that drove by.

Grandpa

Curt's Grandpa's health has been declining, especially over the past several weeks. We went to visit him today and I wanted to take some pictures but felt it would be inappropriate to fully document, especially since he didn't fully understand who we were. Grandpa did respond well to Dax and was excited to have a little one around him. Dax was so sweet and tenderly climbed on Grandpa's bed and kissed him goodbye, Grandpa was delighted. I only took some photos of Curtis and Dax holding his hands as we said our goodbyes for the day, but they tell lots about our love and constant prayer for this sweet man.

We love you Grandpa.

CHEESE-face

This is what I get to work with when I ask Dax to smile for the camera.

I wonder where he gets it from?

Moving Back

Today we packed up our few belongings in our "summer home" in Columbus and moved them back to our house in West Lafayette.

 Dax directed the efforts.

And enjoyed the ride. We are so happy to be back at home for one more year of school.

There's no place like home.

St. Louis Cousins

We took one last summer-weekend road trip and visited Dax's cousins in St. Louis this past weekend. Dax loved these girls and followed them around most the time. It was also good practice for Dax to be around a baby, he gave baby Elsie lots of soft pats and kisses. He's going to be a great brother, although I think these older girls already thought he had the pesky brother act down-pat!

The Magic House

While visiting Tyler’s family in St. Louis for the weekend, we went to their Children’s Museum called “The Magic House”. It really was magic. It was the best Children’s Museum I’ve ever been to, it was incredible and would have been worth the drive in and of itself. They have an amazing village, all child-sized where every shop you go into kids are playing pretend.

This was at the pizza shop, we walked in sat down and little kids dressed up like cooks and waiters came and served us (it was surreal at first). We quickly joined in on the fun of pretend in the village, playing pretend with all the little strangers asking to help us.

Here is Dax taking water over to a stranger.

 Checking out books at the little library.

 Working at the Electric Company.

Working at the Bank, in the safety deposit box section.

The village even had a little hospital!

Dr. Dax helped Daddy pick out a baby from the nursery.

 Then used his checklist to make sure baby brother was healthy.

 Feeding.

Dr. Ruby helped weigh our baby, over 9 lbs (YIKES!).

 

Then Dr. Dax delivered baby brother back to Mommy. 

 Besides the children's village there were amazing exhibit after exhibit.
Dax blowing HUGE bubbles.

 Playing with Stella and more bubbles.

 Among so much else, we visited the Oval Office. Where Dax gave a press conference yelling "yub yub yub" into the microphone, it was compelling.

 And he took some phone calls, doing the business of the country.

 We helped Lewis and Clark on their expedition.

 Mom even got in on the action playing the part of Sacagewea because of my belly. (It was much easier getting in the canoe than out!)

We had a BLAST. There was so much to do and see and it was so nice that Dax could climb on and touch everything. It was entertainment and beyond.

It must be because...

It must be because Dax's sippy cup was just too heavy to carry around one afternoon, that he decided it would be much better to carry it around in the empty silverware basket from the dishwasher.

Off and running

Less than three months ago when we moved down to Columbus we brought with us our little baby Dax, still just crawling. He progressed quickly through toddling, walking and now RUNS most places. It's been amazing how much walking turns your baby into a full-fledged toddler. He looks so much bigger and is into much more mischief now, including running away and hiding from us. He also is now saying "little boy" words with everything, everything has motions with sound effects like "zoom", "crash", "hi-yah!" and "beep beep" added to them by Dax. I find my self saying weird things like "please don't 'hi-yah' your food'" "let's not zoom into Mommy's belly", etc. We were too eager for him to walk and now that he is a little runner, we just have to sit back and laugh at him. He is SO fun and such a sweet kid, plus we think he is cutest thing ever. 

 Excited to show me his new discover, a leaf...

We love this little Dax!