Fort Worth Camera - Pic of the Day!

Our little cutie was selected as one of FW Camera's Pic of the Day shots! Click here. They are celebrating their birthday month so I submitted this one to their birthday contest. This is my sweet Ezra James last year on his 1st birthday. Can't believe we'll be celebrating his 2nd birthday in just two weeks!

Pachyderm Parade

We saw elephants in dowtown Fort Worth last week! Yea for the Ringling Brothers Circus! It's not every day you see elephants walking down the street. I see a trip to the Greatest Show on Earth in our future. :0)

Trying to be productive these last few days of summer. This morning I've been cleaning up my computer, backing up & ordering prints, and working on photo albums. I came across these pics from a few months ago that I never posted. Taken at our old house right before we moved. Got to love Play-Doh!

All Boy

The plan was to take a super cute picture of Ezra to put on his birthday invitation. He saw the dirt and had other ideas. Ezra loves a good pile of dirt.
So I thought I would try it again a few days later. Same result. He also loves rocks and sticks.

Love this little boy!

Nanna & The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Two of Ezra's favorite things.

Raccoon!

Ezra and I saw a big fat raccoon right outside our back door this morning! He was chowing down on Socks' cat food! I hope he enjoyed the Iams Weight Control and Hairball Care cat food. Sounds yummy, right? Guess I'll be bringing the cat food inside now.

This picture is not the raccoon from our porch but a raccoon I discovered while shooting pictures at El Schorcho a few weeks ago. The one from this morning bolted as soon as he saw us. Who knew there were so many raccoons around here!

I went to see Legally Blonde at Bass Hall earlier this week with Francie, Mary Bess, and Addison. I've watched this movie 100 times so it was fun to see it in a musical. And of course I always love hanging out with my sisters and niece. (We missed you Emilie!)

One more from this set. Love this one! He's reading his Cat book. The very last page has this little flap where you can lift it up and find a mouse hiding under the cheese. He loves to find the mouse.

New Bookshelf

If you have been following our blog you know that we have been blessed with a child who loves to read! This makes his Librarian mama so happy! However, since we moved into the new house Ezra hasn't been as interested. Part of the problem is that all of our bookshelves are up high and Ezra hasn't had a shelf to go browse like he did at the old house. So what's a Librarian to do? Build a bookshelf of course! That's right....I built this and am so proud of my handywork! I think Ezra likes it too. I've definitely seen an increase in our reading time. And last night when Sean & Brittney came over the bookshelf was the very first thing that Ezra showed them. (He always gives a tour to anyone who comes over to our house.) He sat down on his comfy pillow, pulled out one of his favorite books, and started telling them all about it. These shots are of our little bookworm before naptime yesterday. He's normally sitting in my lap or right beside me. I love it!

Little Monkey

We're in the Fort Worth Star Telegram today!

I recently entered a photo contest with the FW Star Telegram for "The Best Places to Stand" in North Texas. Didn't win but they put a quote from us in the article today. Check us out....we're in the Life Section in the main article titled "Stand and Deliver." And our favorite pick? The Fort Worth Zoo of course! It's #5 on their list. Here's the pic I entered....

We love the zoo!

I walked into the living room earlier today and this is what I found. Silly boy.

$22 Backyard Makeover

Little projects can make a big difference! Our little back patio makes me smile. There's still quite a bit that could be done in our backyard but seeing flowers out there now brightens it up. There's a little spot for a garden right in front of the garage that we hope to use starting maybe next spring. Here's the after shot....

And here's the before....
And here's one more of our cutie... Our old house goes off the market at midnight tonight. Looks like we'll be renting it starting mid-August. Not the result we hoped for but it's something we're willing to try for a year. Hopefully the market will be better next summer. Our plan is to hold off on major renovations at the new house (bummer) but at least we won't be paying two house payments anymore.

Let's Talk

So we have this kids music CD that Ezra loves. Loves it, loves it, loves it! We’ve listened to it a million times in the car. And Logan & I are about to chunk it out the window. It’s the only thing Ezra will listen to in the car. He always wants it on and only wants to listen to about the first 5 seconds of each song before he shouts "Mama, next song. Please!" So a couple weeks ago I started trying to get by sometimes without the CD . Instead of music I would say to Ezra “Let’s Talk.” And then we would talk about all kinds of things with the music turned off. But for some reason Ezra has it in his head now that when I say “Let’s Talk” then it always needs to start with “monkeys.” Here’s how the conversation usually goes….

Me: Ezra, let’s talk.

Ezra: Monkeys? (Sounded out like Monkeeeeeeeys???)

Me: What do you know about the monkeys?

Ezra: Monkeys fight. (We saw them fighting one time a long time ago.)

Me: What else do you see at the zoo?

Ezra: Gorilla, night-night.

Me: What else?

Ezra: Rhino, pee-pee. (Yep, we saw that. You can see lots of things at the zoo!)

Me: What other animals?

Ezra: Giraffes.

Me: What about the giraffes?

Ezra: Loooooong neck. Tall!

Me: What else?

Ezra: Sit down (We saw the giraffes sitting down one time recently. It was kind of odd to see about 10 giraffes all sitting on the ground.)

Me: What about the flamingos?

Ezra: Pink!

Me: And the elephants?

Ezra: Ball. (We saw them playing with the ball recently.)

Me: What does the lion say?

Ezra: Roar!!!!!

Me: What about the meerkats?

Ezra: Two!

Me: What else?

Ezra: Little!

So that’s the conversation we have every day. Several times a day. Sometimes there are different animals but these ones usually make it into the conversation somewhere. And as always this brings a smile to my face.

p.s. - The top picture is Ezra looking down at the Rhino. And this last shot is Ezra looking at the gorilla.