Halloween, Christmas, 18-month b-day, etc!

So, Mitch is 18 months old and we wanted to take another elephant picture to compare how big he's gotten! I've been quite the posting slacker so now I have lots of pictures from many months that are all going in this post.

Say "Cheese!"

Mitch and mom

Mitch playing with his friend Travis

Peek-a-boo

Matt gave Mitch his old cell phone, he loves pushing all the buttons and adding new contacts-it's a good thing he can't actually call anyone on it!

A few weeks ago we finally moved Mitch out of the alcove upstairs and into his own room. Here is a portion of it-we painted the walls and the tree and the birds are decal stickers.

A few days after Christmas it snowed in Portland. It came down and collected pretty quickly. It was awesome packing snow so we threw snowballs for the dog and made snowmen. Mitch loved throwing the snow but didn't quite understand how to not have it stick to his mittens!

Mitch playing with some of his Christmas presents. Mom and MItch cutting a wooden tomato...

Mitch playing in his tunnel...

...wearing the hat Mom knit for him.

Neither Matt nor I did this as kids but we decided we wanted to start a tradition of decorating gingerbread houses each Christmas. Mitch had fun putting the candies on and didn't even lick too much frosting (we kept calling it glue!)

Christmas Eve after church

Visiting Santa at the mall. The first few pictures they took were not so happy, then Matt sat with him and we made lots of funny faces to get to this point!

Just playing...

Mitch and Dad

We went trick-or-treating in the dorms at a local college-it was perfect: indoor, enough candy and fast! Mitch was pretty much overwhelmed and didn't utter a word the whole time!

Mitch as sock monkey

Putting on the Halloween costume.

The top pumpkin was Matt's, the middle one Kate's. The bottom one we had Mitch draw with a marker on the pumpkin, then Matt did a connect the dots sort of thing to get the pattern.

Carving pumpkins after Mitch went to bed.

Picking out pumpkins at the farm...Mitch had more fun pulling (or trying to pull) the wagon around. He basically loves anything with a long handle that he can push or pull.

Here's a video of Mitch...he likes to watch Mom put on makeup and has his own brush to play with. You will see he doesn't always just put it on his face.

Wisconsin Trip

So we went to Wisconsin for a wedding (Matt's cousin) and got to spend some time with both families. It was great to see everyone and I really wish we all lived closer together. Mitch had a great time with his cousins and grandparents, aunts and uncles. We miss you all!!!!

Playing with Gabrielle...

...and Grandpa got caught up in the fun too!

Mitch with Grandma M.


Here's Mitch and mom at the Racine Zoo

This is Mitch roaring at the lion. It was pretty cool, the lion and the tiger were roaring back and forth at eachother and then MItch joined in!


Besides the lion I think the slide was Mitch's favorite feature of the zoo. Here he is with Grandpa M. catching him at the bottom.

Wheee!

After a few days in Racine we went up to Slinger to Grandma and Grandpa G's. Grandma and Mitch spent lots of time outside. Here they are walking along the pier.

Mitch got all dressed up for the wedding in his suit. Grandma G also emptied out a suitcase for him to pull around (which he did every day up and down the hallway). I love this picture because he looks like a little business man!

Family self-portrait in the church

The bride and groom, Sarah and Ben

Cousins: Liz, Troy, Sarah, Jim, Sheryl and Matt

I was really excited for Mitch to dance now that he's really good at walking but he was soooo tired that he was falling asleep on my shoulder! We danced a little bit but we made it an early night (for us, late night for him).

The Geigers and the Oakleys out for breakfast

Mitch with his cousins Evan and Annie

Mitch also had a great time meeting Great Grandma and Great Grandpa.

One giant posting

Okay, here it is...I have been a big slacker when it comes to posting and with no good excuse other than life gets busy. So, here, in no particular order, are some pictures of what we've been up to since August. Also there will be more to come hopefully soon.

Here are some pictures from my cousin, Kelly's wedding in Grand Rapids.

All four sisters posing in the bathroom--NOT naked though the strapless dresses make it look like we are.

The little boys getting tired: Grandpa holding Nick and Kate holding Mitch

The bride and groom

Bridesmaid sisters in church

Mitch and Dad in church

We had another wedding to attend the next weekend in Walla Walla, WA-we camped overnight (Mitch and mom slept in the truck while Dad and friends were in tents). Here we are just hanging out.

Matt and Kate-another self-portrait

Getting dressed in the truck the next morning

Now for just some random cute pictures of Mitch doing regular ol' stuff.

Sitting in the living room, looking out the window


Climbing up the stairs (naked, obviously)


Standing in the crib (naked again)


Sleeping. You can see how long ago these pics were taken, Mitch was napping in only a diaper because it was so hot! Now we have the heat on and he wears fleece pj's!


Drinking milk...this was to document the curling hair before we cut off his mullet!

Here's Mitch waiting for his first haircut-Dad went first and there wasn't anyone else there so Mitch got to run around and play with the brooms.

...and lay on the floor

Not quite sure what's going on, but sitting sort of still at first

Tired of sitting, now standing on the chair to finish the cut.