Where Did My Babies Go?!?!

Well, time is continuing to fly by. Patrick recently hit the 2.5 year mark and Graham is already 5 months old. A lot has happened with our two boys in the last couple months since my last post. Let's start with The Patness Monster. 

Mr. Patrick is such a sweet, caring little boy and he loves his little brother so much. From the moment Graham wakes up in the morning until they go to bed at night, Patrick is giving Graham hugs and kisses. He yells at Sophie to stop barking when Graham is sleeping; "woof woof nooooooo"! He gets a wipe to clean Graham's face when he spits up. The list goes on, and it just makes my heart burst every time!

Patrick's speech is still very far behind but it's definitely starting to pick up. He recently started calling Graham "baby". We are very excited to start speech therapy for him soon. There is nothing wrong, nothing to be concerned about, but we want to help our little guy learn to express himself with his words more. 

We have had some beautiful weekends lately, so Patrick and Delmar have been spending a lot of time out in the yard working on the garden. Nothing makes Patrick happier than being outside, getting in the dirt, using his tools just like Daddy, and driving his truck like Daddy too. Patrick loves taking care of the animals too. We recently sold our ducks but we will have 10 new chickens in about two weeks when they're old enough to live outside in our chicken coop. Patrick used to collect the duck eggs every morning, clean them, and package them up all on his own. He is going to be so excited to have birds in the yard and eggs to collect again.

Mr. Graham is just growing up so fast, I can't believe it. He started rolling over just after he turned three months. These days he's rolling around in all directions. For a baby who doesn't crawl yet, I don't understand how he moves around so much when I put him down on a blanket! He absolutely adores his older brother. All day long he's tracking Patrick. He's watching and learning everything Patrick does. He recently started eating rice cereal and I don't think he could have possibly been more enthusiastic to be eating solid food! He was lunging his head forward and reaching for the spoon with his hands. He even managed to get a hold of the spoon a few times and brought it to his mouth. I was very impressed! I don't think we're going to have much trouble getting this kid to eat! 

For those of you who are wondering, Graham's eyes are still blue! They are a very dark blue though, unlike Patrick. From afar his eyes look dark but they're actually blue, while his hair looks like but up close is actually very dark. Delmar and I think that he looks just like my dad. He has those tiny Asian eyes and those giant Nakamoto cheeks!

 

       Our little potsticker! Look at those Nakamoto genes shining through.

                                                Eyes on brother all the time!

These pictures are all before Graham had his first hair cut. Most of his newborn hair fell out, leaving behind a very awkward comb over, which we decided to cut off. He's a very sharp looking young man now :)

                    

Graham is just the happiest baby I've ever met. He wakes up cooing and smiling, and he just keeps smiling and laughing all day long. It's wonderful!

      Playing with his ball!

 

      Enjoying his first rice cereal!

Here are a few pictures from Patrick's Easter Egg this year, with the help of Uncle Mike and Auntie Lauren. 

  

We put cars inside plastic eggs for Patrick. Boy loves his cars!

One last parting shot... :) 

3 Month Old Graham

I am writing this blog post to you today from Ramone's Cafe, one of my favorite spots in town, while the boys are off with Daddy. Delmar sent me off this morning for my "mommy parole" :) 

Well, believe it or not, Graham is three months old. Somehow he seems so much older than that already. He is such a happy boy, laughing, smiling and engaging all day long! And he's already rolling onto his side. My baby boy is growing up so fast.

Graham gets "nakey time" every morning when he wakes up. He's always such a happy boy first thing in the morning. Patrick is always so excited when his brother gets up. Patrick doesn't understand the loose cannon that naked little brother can be and has been peed on several times :) Graham seems to enjoy laying on his side because he can reach his hand easier to suck on it. He hasn't managed to dislodge his thumb from his fist yet but I'm not sure if he wants to. He seems to like the full fist sucking!

                                              

I love these pictures because you can tell that Graham is watching Patrick play with his trains in the top picture, and that Patrick is watching over Graham in the bottom one. 

Patrick is becoming such a grown up boy too! His language is still a bit behind but he improves every day. He's putting a few words together at a time and he is slowly adding to his vocabulary. Last night in his sleep, I heard him say "mama apple"! 

Patrick is also expanding beyond his little man sports and trucks personality to having quite a creative side. He loves to dance, draw and paint. Here are a couple pictures of him painting. And yes he is naked, we're potty training :) 

We have had a lot of rain up here this winter which has created a giant puddle in our driveway. While it isn't very convenient for me loading and unloading the baby and all the gear in and out of the car, Patrick and the ducks absolutely love it! Patrick drives his truck through and around the puddle for an average of 30 minutes a day, and then gets out and plays in the puddle with the ducks. Here are a few pictures of him playing and feeding the ducks. 

You can see the pieces of food hitting the water. The tricky part is keeping the dog from chasing off the ducks and eating the food herself! 

Well that's about all for this month. I'd like to take advantage of my "mommy parole" and this beautiful day. 

Love,

Sarah

Graham Dean Tompkins

I can't believe it has already been two months since our precious baby boy, Graham Dean, was born. We welcomed a very healthy 8 lb, 19.5 inch long bundle of joy to our family on October 24th. He didn't want to come out but he seems to be pretty happy now that he has.

For those of you who can't tell for sure from these small photos whether or not Graham looks much like his older brother, the answer is yes! Can you tell who is who?!?

I'll give you a hint, Graham likes his pacifier more than Patrick ever did ;)

Patrick has been such a fantastic older brother. He loves to give his little brother kisses and hugs, and he likes to have Graham sleep on his belly (I think he saw Mommy 

and Daddy doing this).

Patrick put stickers all over Graham's face. You can guess how Graham felt about it :) 

Patrick does want to be treated like a baby on occasion. Here Nana is holding both of he "baby" boys 

Patrick loves his brother!

Cutie Pie!!!

Well, I'm having technical difficulties, so that's all for now before I get too frustrated! I hope to be able to add more pictures and stories soon.

Love,

Sarah

Big Boy, Big Belly

I know it has been ages since I last did an update on Patrick or the progress of our bun in the oven. All I can say is that I have been a little distracted. I'll do my best to summarize Patrick's development in the last few months and share the photos that I have, but there aren't many. Delmar likes to describe my "nesting" as "gettin' twiggy", which surprisingly manifests itself in me being crafty! I know it's hard to believe, but I've been spending Patrick's naptimes working on art projects to decorate the boy's bedrooms.

Despite our disbelief, Patrick will be turning two years old in just over a month. He has developed into quite the little man, quite literally. He's a little man's man. Here's a list of Patrick's usual daily activities: playing with his toy trucks and cars, playing with his toy trucks and cars inside my Subaru, playing with his toy trucks and cars on top of his dog, Sophie, playing in Mommy and Daddy's cars (he can get the keys in the ignition but luckily can't turn it all the way!), playing soccer and t-ball, and tormenting Sophie and his ducks. He's a simple boy with a few simple interests and we love him for it!

Oh, and he loves the dirt! Playing with his cement mixer truck.

Playing in Daddy's lawn mower, sitting where the battery should be :)

Before I forget to mention it, I should tell those of you that haven't heard yet that Bailey is no longer with us. Unfortunately, we had to put him down after he bit Patrick on the face. Luckily Patrick is just fine, he just has a few nice scars now. I actually took a few great pictures of Patrick and Delmar about and hour before it happened. Here they are.

My models :)

The day after Patrick was bit, we went up to The Sandy Bar Ranch on the Klamath River up in Orick again with the rest of the Nakamotos. Patrick was a trooper. He didn't even seem to be bothered by his swollen shut, black eye. We were all able to still have an amazing trip, we just had to keep a close eye on Patrick to keep him out of the sand and water the first couple days.

I guess the last big change for Patrick is that he now has his own "big boy" bedroom. We moved him into the guest room, where he has his own twin size bed! It's so adorable when he's all curled up at night, he barely takes up a quarter of the bed. I'll add a couple pictures of his bedroom but the wall decorations that I'm working on still aren't hanging yet. I'll have to add some pictures of those later because I am very proud of them!

Patrick still isn't talking a whole lot but he's definitely getting closer. We hear lots of "mama" and "dada", he's really good at "more" and "no" and his "hi" and "bye-bye" are pretty adorable when he also blows you a kiss. Everyone else hears him say more words but it all sounds like jabbering to us. With time it'll become more clear I'm sure.

So that's our Big Boy, now onto my Big Belly. I have officially entered the third trimester. Personally, I can't believe I still have three months to go. I am much bigger than with Patrick and definitely less mobile. During my 20 week ultrasound we found out that we are having another boy! And he looked very healthy, which is all we really cared about anyways (two kidneys, yay!). So in about 12 weeks (hopefully less!), Patrick will have a new little brother named Graham Dean. We're so excited to meet him!

This is Patrick trying to get to the frosting inside of the cupcake that would reveal the gender of his younger sibling...it was blue frosting!

Well, that's all for now folks!

Love,
Sarah