Baby Matthew

My friend Heather and her husband Mike welcomed their first born last week. I got the chance to go visit with them a few days ago and take a few pictures of baby Matthew. He is so tiny and perfect and I'm so happy for the whole family. He's joining a beautiful large family and has 6 older siblings at home who are just crazy about him already!

As for us, we went apple picking last weekend. Oisín was in absolute heaven, apples are pretty much his all time favorites. He kept looking around and gesturing wildly to us, making happy baby babble about all the apples he could see. Thousands and thousands of them all over the place.

That place was a zoo I tell ya. Everyone and their mom wanted in on the apple action.

Eeeeeeekkkkkkkk, did I mention Oscar got a haircut?! I'll post about it soon.

Otherwise it's just life as normal around here.

Maija's been out of school for the last week trying to rest and recover from her concussion. We looked through some of her baby photos the other day and I was horrified to discover that I have no idea where her baby book is. It will turn up....

Micah joined flag football and choir this fall, and is busy getting used to the homework load of a fifth grader, which much to his dismay is much greater than that of a fourth grader....

Sidhe is busy as ever coming up with new ideas and trying out all sorts of face painting techniques. I swear if there is something that interests her she goes for it. I love this so much about her.

Saoirse has started crying at school again, just for drop offs, but it's not fun for either one of us and of course has me wondering if I made the right choice. When I pick her up a few hours later (she only does a 3 hour morning session) she is totally fine and tells me all about her morning, so I'm still hopeful that it's just a phase as she adjusts to her new schedule. Even though her day is broken into two parts, being divided between two schools must be exhausting for her.

Here's what the rest of the day looks like: Wake up the baby, go pick up Saoirse, go pick up Maija, have lunch, drop Saoirse off at her other school, sneak in a walk, take Maija back to school (her half day is being broken into two shorter sessions so that she can see all her academic teachers, she'll miss lunch and dance which conveniently fall right in the middle of everything), pick up Saoirse, pick up the twins, pick up Maija, pick up Finn (who stays late today for a class), drop everyone off at home and then drive to Franklin to pick up Micah. So, yeah, that's a lot of driving. Happy Thursday everyone!

Little Fawn's Big Day

Our little fawn is officially one year old.

We celebrated last week with some carrot cake, his first cold and a concussion. I can remember the night I went into labor with him as if it was yesterday, and I know I ALWAYS say that, but it is so true. We watched Goodfellas and timed contractions and Brendan thought I was faking it until I finally told him to get the car packed up and called my mom at 12:30am. It was the first time I ever went into labor on my own. We got to the hospital in the middle of the night and he arrived at 7:44am. Chubby and soft and ready for cuddling.

How can the newborn from just one short year ago suddenly be this big guy?

Following tradition we piled up on the porch steps for a group birthday shot, and I know that it might seem silly to everyone in the moment, but it is going to be awesome to look back at these over the coming years. Everyone is changing way too fast. As I sat to edit this, I started thinking about how next fall when we take Oisín's birthday picture Finn will be away at college! Good thing we have a ton of other birthdays before then.

I ran out of carrots while making this cake. Fortunately one of my lovely neighbors had a few to spare. Then as I was trying to get the batter mixed a nurse from Maija's high school called to say he thought she might have a concussion. Fortunately her grandpa was able to run right over and pick her up from school and then Brendan came home from work early to take her to the doctor while I shuttled around for afternoon school pickups. She totally does have a concussion too, poor thing.

Once all the running around was done, there was nothing left to do except frost the cake (thank you Ruari for playing with baby so I could quickly turn the cream cheese into sugary goodness) and then sing happy birthday. The singing made him cry, but he seemed to enjoy the cake.

I've probably already told you plenty of times, but we are just in love with this baby boy of ours. Over the moon in fact.