New cousin....YEAH!!...and other random stuff

First and foremost, there is a new Bulluck in this world:
Jonah Thomas Bulluck

A brand new grandboy, cousin, nephew, and first son to Ana and Travis, who seem to be taking the new role of parents with grace and raw skill.  Here's to Jonah, and to Mom and Dad for being wonderful parents already, taking it in stride... a new stride that is.  We are excited to see him again soon, either by skype or more preferably in person!

This meant a quick yet very enjoyable visit to see everyone in NC.

The boys had a great time, as always, at Grammy and PaPa's.  Walking over to see the chickens across the road, riding in the trailer behind the "tractor", riding bikes down the driveway, chillin' in the baby pool, playing with the collection of matchbox cars, and so much more....

Nothing like a little nakey buns time around the homestead for example.....

PaPa pulled out his banjo (from many years ago) and let the boys strum on it.  They loved putting the picks on their fingers mostly.

On a completely unrelated note, Jason and I have been working to create a food blog for the boy's school.  Part of tuition is to volunteer so many hours each year and we have been thinking about making a cookbook with our Vhours.  This idea morphed into a blog (Jason is the chair of the food committee).  The primary goal is to share ideas for healthy lunches with new parents - the school has pretty strict rules on what can be brought for lunch and many new parents have a hard time with this.  We are also (as you will see) posting dinner ideas and other general tips on how working parents can cook healthily, easily.  We will solicit recipes from other parents here soon and Jason will make some trips into the classroom to photograph healthy lunches to post as well.  So stay tuned for lots more activity as we release it to all parents and get more reipes in the coming weeks/months.  Check it out if you like HERE.

The weather just got much cooler here as a cold front made its way in.  We are loving it - the boys were so excited to put on long pajamas after their bath tonight.  Alder is SO funny these days.  He is developing an even more fun and unique personality that makes us smile so often.

Also, his imagination is exploding.  The other morning, he and Heath were pirates and the couch was their ship.  When I came home later that day, they had picked it right back up and Jason had made an island, where they set up a tent (large blanket over the furniture).  They were marooned there and were cooking dinner over a fire (metal bowl full of very random things).

Alright one more....Last night when the boys were supposed to be calming down to go to sleep, I walked down the hall to tell them to quiet down, but stopped to hear what they were saying first.  Alder was pretending to be a doctor and was giving Heath's dog pillow (pillow pet) two shots followed by "cars bandaids".  The voice he was using was hilarious - sort of an urgent, this is so important, be still while I make you all better voice with lots of "all rights, ok's" thrown in.  Heath is there mimicing every other word and trying to be just as serious.  I really need to record them.

Here's an example of the routine randomness that happens quite normally.  Its amazing to think they are seeing things completely differently from us as they play.  Hopefully as they get older they can continue to be so free and capricious, without concern for trivial matters like whether they are doing things "right", what they look like or are wearing, etc.