Happy Birthday Soren! Here is the little guy being put back into his high chair after he tried an alternate method for blowing out his candle--the touch method. It was quite successful at extinguishing the flame, but it surprised him and definitely brought on some tears. No burn resulted, thankfully.
Yum-ba! Banana cake with chocolate cream cheese frosting. He even got to use a fork to use and you can see how proud he is of this new implement.
Soren seems to be spell-bound by cameras much of the time so we get a lot of pictures of this stare.
Here it is, the banana cake with the chocolate cream cheese frosting shaped like a number one. It is very delicious and we enjoyed some more of it last night with our dinner. Einar picked the flowers from our yard to decorate the cake tray. If you like corner pieces with frosting, this is a good shape for a cake to be. It was also really easy to slice.
Dinner was a success too with beef tri-tip, broccoli, mashed potatoes and green salad.
On Sunday while I went to a baby shower in Encinitas with a friend of ours, Jared stayed home with the FOUR kids. After making pizza for lunch they spent much of their time outside in the garage and along the side of the house riding bikes, playing with sidewalk chalk and playing t-ball.
"I see you Mom." How many pictures do you need of me eating this dinner?"
Jared, Molly (age 3), Einar (age 4), Jacob (age 6). Hey, where is Soren?
Here we are all together with someone else available to take our picture.
Look, a little bit of a belly (although it might just be muscle) and those curls are too cute to cut quite yet. I think we'll have to wait until his hair starts to interfere with his sight until his first haircut. Besides, didn't Einar already get the honors in February?
He is on the move.
Soren likes to be tossed up in the air and I think Jared likes doing it for him.
Jacob and Einar enjoying balloons from the baby shower. Einar's balloon sailed off into the sunset about 30 seconds after this shot was taken and He fell apart.
Oops, I didn't turn this picture around, but this is of the kids eating yummy Jared pizza for lunch.
Soren makes a good outfielder for a t-ball game. Watch out Ichiro!
Playing in the sand at Point Mugu on Saturday morning. He also tried to eat a bunch of this sand.
This is Reeder and Einar in the back of the Mazda 5 for our road trip to Port Huenume. They had a video player strung up in front of them for a princess movie and continuous showings of CARS. The middle seats were where Soren and his buddy Hayes were planted and all the available space in the car was taken up with the rest of the stuff. It's a good thing that none of the kids have super long legs yet!
Marianne catching some rays after doing a masterful job repacking the car.
Please don't call CPS. The little boys enjoyed a raisin snack in the parking lot while we were packing up the car to leave on Saturday. This wasn't your average hotel parking lot with lots of cars moving around though. We stayed at the Navy lodge on base and on Saturday morning, most of the Navy guys were sound asleep.
Soren was drawn to the industrial toilet with the black seat in our room. I'm not sure why the alarm clock was in the bathroom.
Finally sleep for both of the boys. Soren slept with me and Einar on the "nest" that we made for him in the corner of the room from two chair cushions.
Einar's nest. He pointed out that it is not round like Big Bird's nest, but rectangular.
Crabs in the Santa Barbara Harbor.
Getting off of Lil'Toot after our water taxi ride in Santa Barbara.
Check out his pony-tail. This was one happy kid while on Lil' Toot.
Pelicans in the harbor.
Toot Toot!
Reeder and Einar got to drive Lil' Toot while we were going around the pier and until we got into the harbor. I think Einar did it 3 times.
Our whole lively crew on Lil' Toot.
Here comes Lil' Toot.
The Santa Barbara Aquarium is perfect for the age children that we had along with us. This is the puppet show corner that we spent some time putting on shows. Reeder was the announcer and Einar had the whales eating the octopus and the crab.
"Look Mom, cheese crackers!"
That is a shark that we all got to touch. It took Einar a while to warm up to the idea of touching a shark (or anything in the touch tanks), but he gave me a high five and did a dance after he touched this one.
Looking through cool sliding magnifying glasses into a tidal pool tank.
Ear protection is now needed at our breakfast table since Soren is screeching like an Eaglet. Check out Einar's oatmeal. He puts sprinkles on it and it turns his milk pink.
This is a picture of the bed invaders caught red-handed. We don't exactly know when Einar slipped in next to me and Soren came in when he woke up at around 5:30. He just wanted a fresh diaper and some more milk to get him through until it was wake-up time. On most mornings, Soren is a pretty good alarm clock because he wakes up for good at 7:30am. It's a good thing that we don't have a dog because our Queen-sized bed just wouldn't be big enough!
Things are getting messy around our table now that Soren wants to use the spoon and feed himself. Unless he is really hungry he won't let me shovel it into his mouth anymore. Maybe we do need a dog to help with all of the food on the floor.
Mommy left for an evening for a PTF meeting and a massage and Daddy got the kids to bed or at least to sleep. They had lots of fun playing trains. Soren even had his own tracks and engines in his pack and play.
A bit of hot chocolate to start the evening out right.
Soren with his tracks and trains. He was let out to play with the big boys once the train tracks were all constructed.
These are the two animals that grew out of the eggs that the boys got for Easter. They kind of look like they could glow in the dark because they are so bright.
Can we rent the neighbor's dog?
What?!?!?! There seems to be foil on my chocolate egg!!! 
Soren really likes chocolate and couldn't wait to take the wrappers off before he started in on his Easter candy.
"What is in here?"
Looking through the Easter bunny loot.
These are the eggs that housed the alligator and dinosaur. Here they are submerged in water.
"Look, Mom. Einar is sleeping, can I wake him up?" Good luck Soren, Einar had passed out while he was sick and almost missed his dinner. I don't think even screeching by the "Eaglet" would have woken him up that night.
Soren's first time out. He came up to me and bit me in the leg while I was on the computer.
