Photo Contest

Here are the three pictures I entered in the black and white category of the annual photo contest at the Edwardsville Library.

Oh my goodness he is sweet!

I love how Joshua always makes his grandparents smile.

This one actually won. I think it is the directional lighting and the shadow on one side of his face that put it over the top. Thanks for your help little buddy!

Here is a link to the official results:
http://www.edwardsvillelibrary.org/misc/photo.html

Forrest Park and Zoo

We took advantage of a beautiful day today to get some fall pictures of our family and go to the zoo. It turns out that it was "Boo at the Zoo" day and it was really crowded. But we still had a great time.

A family portrait in Forrest Park.


and another one


on the way to our photo shoot...


hanging out with papa.


having a snack before we went to see the elephants.


A cooperative elephant getting his (or her) picture taken.


Lounging in my wagon at the end of the day.

Punkins!

So, our blog is again ridiculously out of date. Here are some pictures from a recent trip with Gramma and Grampa Dickson to an apple and pumpkin farm.

Having some lunch near a cool old truck.


Walking in the apple orchard.


It was getting close to nap time and I was sick of all these pumpkins.


OK, one more cute pose, but this is the last one.

More Fourth of July Pictures

Mainly I am trying out Picasa for Linux and its "BlogThis!" feature, but here are some more cute pictures of Joshua on the Fourth of July (I guess cute and Joshua is redundant, but oh well).

Walking!

It has been a long time coming, but Joshua is finally starting to walk.
Check out these videos:

July 2009

So, our blog updating has fallen to Bowman-like levels. For that we are deeply sorry. It has been a busy first half of the summer. Here are some recent pictures (Fourth of July and such).

Joshua and My New Lens

As an early Father's Day gift, Missy got me a great new lens for our camera. It is excellent in low light (f1.8), which is awesome because we love to take natural light pictures of Joshua (no flash!). Check these out.







I think this last one is hilarious. Joshua has a book with pictures of foods with different textures. It has sand paper for chicken nuggets. He licked the sandpaper way before he ever ate chicken nuggets. Here he is licking some velcro. Funny stuff.

Joshua vs. The Beach Ball

So, after a month with no new blog posts, today you get two in one day.



So, Joshua's speech therapist gave us a deck of cards that has ideas of fun stuff to do with your toddler. One of the ideas was to tie a beach ball to a string and hang it so your child can hit it. It turned out to be pretty darn cute.

Joshua Ate Chicken Nuggets and Fries!

For most families, this would not be news. But for the parents of the pickiest eater in the world, this is a big deal. Joshua refuses to put most foods in his mouth based solely on texture. If it isn't a chip, it isn't going in. BBQ potato chips are a staple. So, a somewhat softer texture and some protein (besides milk and yogurt) are a big deal. Yeah buddy!



This is just me being cute:

I love to play on the landing. I like to pull up on the bars. But I still like to pretend I don't know how to get down from this one step.

Reading and climbing!

Joshua's new favorite past times are reading and climbing! He likes to bring a little ball up the stairs with him. At least once a day now we climb up our big set of stairs and sometimes down again :) He also has been enjoying his books more. He definitely has some favorites that we've memorized but he loves dragging a book over to us and can sit and read with us a long time! We love our little reader and hope you enjoy the pictures :)

a favorite book...

look at that big toothy grin :)

Go buddy go!!!

Joshua's Jungle Birthday Party

All the grandparents came for visits and celebrations. Grammy was here for Joshua's party with his friends!

Daddy and Joshua opening up his gifts!

Emmy...Joshua's little friend.

After cake with 2 other celebrations where Joshua cried and didn't want cake...at his party he tried some... not the crazy mess like you'd expect though :)

Happy Birthday to you sweet boy!

Isaac ...another little friend...I painted the lion and Ryan took the pictures :)

Bailey...the ferocious tiger!

In the "jungle"

The jungle chicken, Anthony!

Dressed like a leopard with monkey slippers and ready to party!

Little animals for the party guests and bowls of jungle animal crackers...

Lion cupcakes

Elephant birthday cake - my first shaped cake...it took more than one try :)

To all our faithful friends and family who check the blog - sorry it has been so long since we posted! Hope you enjoyed some pictures of Joshua's birthday party - a jungle theme with his little friends. It was a great day and were so thankful for all the presents from everyone.