Emily's 1st Birthday

Emily turns 1, February 11, 2011! We celebrating on the 12th just the day after her actual birthday! Her strawberry dress worked perfectly for the theme of the party...in honor of her Gramma Hogan! Mom would have loved the dress, shoes and of course the cake! All of the plate s and decorations were brought straight from Gramma's extensive stash back at Grandpa's house. Emily was just a joy! We had a great turn out for the party and
all the family was able to attend! We attended one of Adam's basketball games before the party and then came back for food, fun, & presents! Everyone brought a book for Emily to start her own library of books. It was neat to see all the variety of new and used books friends and family brought! Adam was a big helper when it was time to open presents! Check out the video of everyone singing Happy Birthday to Emily...the ending is classic!! A quick pose with Gram after opening some presents!

Emily & Grandpa Hogan

Emily eating her cake...


Nanny and Emily below...Emily was very close to her first steps!!




Emily with the book sent by Great Grandmother Gin...who was unable to attend the party!!


Video of singing Happy Birthday to Emily...not Ryan...

Basketball Season

Adam played basketball this winter with one of the West Salem teams. He started off taking in each aspect of the game focusing in on exactly what his job was...slowly learning how you have to really be thinking about your job while adjusting as other players adjust, as the ball moves, and of course how the other team is playing as well.


Adam got to play a number of different positions and seemed to take something away from each experience. He is pictured to the left with his team and coaches before the 1st game...listening to every word.


He takes a practice shot before the game...I'm sure this one was a swish!! Also check out the incredible jump defending another player.

Adam is SO into his sports and really does a great job being a student of the game as well as an excellent listener to his coaches. By the end of the season Adam's game had just "clicked". The highlight of the season was Adam joining the "Buzzer Beater Club". In one of his last games Adam got the ball and put up a shot just before the buzzer sounded for the end of the 1st half and the bucket went "swish" and the crowd went crazy!! At that point it didn't matter which team you were routing for everyone just cheered!! It was an awesome, awesome thing to see! His arms went straight up into the air and he jumped probably higher than in the picture above with excitement!!

Adam also strived to be a good defender as you can see he is covering 2 players in the picture below. It was really a shame to see the season come to an end because all of the boys were working so well together and really playing like a team! I guess that is what next year is for!!

At the Basketball Banquet Coach Greer said Adam was by far the most improved player on the team! Great job Adam!!!

Adam looses a tooth...

and not just any tooth the 2nd of his two front teeth! Too bad this didn't happen before Christmas...we hope he wouldn't have to wait until next Christmas for his 2 front teeth! After much work on his 1st front tooth the 2nd one came out with a lot less work. Adam has been a warrior when it comes to his teeth...too much to share in this post.

I am happy to report also that both the boys got excellent reports from our dentist earlier this month (April) ...no cavities, something we have long waited for. Way to go ADAM!!!

1st of the year CLEAN OUT!!

It is January 1st (or at least in this post anyway)...and we feel ever so inspired. Having a sick child will do that. Our plans were thwarted the day before early on the 31st of December...we were getting up early to head to Maryland for a friend's wedding when Adam woke up throwing up. Never a good thing but especially when you are going to be hosted by friends with 4 children of their own. We had to cancel our trip and spent the next 24 hours taking care of Adam and praying no one else caught the bug.

So comes Saturday, the 1st of January, in the midst of cleaning the house of germs and realizing all the new things we got for Christmas it was time to purge. A friend from church was sharing how she had each of her children (3) pick their 5 favorite toys and then she shipped everything else off to the Rescue Mission. Hmmm... this made me think...really 5 toys each so I said "so you have 15 toys in your house and that is it???" This really was too much for me to wrap my brain around but none the less I was inspired at her hard core approach. So the purge begins...

We brought EVERY toy in the house to the den...pictured above...I mean every toy. We were going to go through every "guy" (aka...action people, characters and Happy Meal toy), as well as every match box car, and every other misc. toy we have accumulated through 8 Christmas's, 12 birthday parties, and many other for no reason gifts our children have received!! As you can see this can be a very hard thing to do with the children...pictured below...Adam and Ryan have a battle with lightsabers...and Emily in the right side in her saucer...with Daddy entertaining. Were we crazy?? Probably but we did manage to get through every toy. We had 3 full (overflowing) 18 gallon containers to donate/sell at yard sale this summer and 2 or 3 bags of trash. It is amazing when you really pile everything up to see the excess. Now we in now way got close to 15 toys but we did manage to get rid of a lot of clutter and felt wonderful after doing it.