The Banks Off Shore: March 2011

Liam has always loved animals. One of his first words was "Moooo" in Africa. We do not have pets, but he reads about animals all the time and watches the neighbor's cat.

He has one book that categorizes animals like "In the backyard", "In the water", etc. His favorite page is "On the Farm." By the way, I had to laugh because the page with Zebras, Giraffes, etc is titled "At the Zoo." How neat is it that Liam has seen those wild animals in their native habitat while we went on Safari at Masai Mara!

Anyways, we recently took Liam to the Rutledge-Wilson Farm, which is a farm that is part of the Parks system here in Springfield. Kids can look at the animals and then play on the playground that looks like a barn. He had a blast!!

Here are the highlights below. I won't comment on every picture because several are just of Liam! If you have a toddler, you know it can be difficult to get a picture of your child's face, much less a clear one! So here is our fun day "On the Farm!"

The stare-down.

Just can't get close enough!

This one is for Uncle Levi: Turkeys and Tigers!

Trying to climb the ladder. Mommy had to help a little.

Here he sits in denial that the park is closing and he has to go home. Hopefully it will warm up again soon and we can go back!!

Party time!

Can you believe it? Liam is 2! Well, in some sense it feels like Liam already was a two year old. People have always been surprised how young he is, based on what he is doing and saying. He has been like that his whole life! Walking at 9 months, speaking 40 words by 12 months, counting to 10 by 18 months, saying the ABC's by 20 months, etc.

He surprises us every day with new words or phrases. Just last night Liam raised the two arms on his C3PO doll and said "Praise the Lord!" He can color purposefully with a crayon. By that I mean if I say "Liam, color this foot red", he can do it! Not inside the lines or anything, but right on the foot area at least. He stacks 10 blocks, but the 11th always seems to fall! He loves to run, jump, walk backwards, wrestle with Logan, roll (or crash) anything with wheels, throw balls, read books, and watch Duck Tales.

We got his hair cut this week so he would be all fresh for his party!

Last year we were in Kenya for his first birthday. We celebrated with the Kenyan children in our neighborhood and had a party with the other missionary kids. Luke and Riley were there, but no Grandparents. So this year we had a party just for the Grandparents! And Auntie Clarice, who has kind of adopted Liam as her boy! Can I just say up front that Liam did amazingly well at his party. As well as you could ask a two year old to do at least.

He was so excited to have balloons in his house! He would jump up and down and say "look at all the balloons!"

Logan tied a big bundle to the stairwell and next thing we know, the little guy some how knocked them loose and they were floating to the ceiling!

He just stood on the stairs looking up saying, "oh no what happened?" Daddy to the rescue. He got them down and the party could continue!

His cake was a chocolate #2 decorated like a road with cars on it!

He was much more interested in the cars than the cake that is for sure! I think he took one bite and then ate the grapes on his plate instead. Then off to play with his new cars! I wish I ate more grapes than cake! Same with the car shaped cookies: he just drove them around until they crumbled!

He sat at his new table from Mommy and Daddy and opened his presents one by one taking time to enjoy each gift.

It was so precious. His very first present was a stack of Dr. Seuss books from Aunt Kari and Uncle John. He plopped right down on the floor among all of his unopened presents and started "reading" his new book!