These are a few of my favorite things

Josiah has two enduring favorites in his life:

Big Froggy:

and Popcorn:

Life is sweet:-)

Way overdue

So, I have been SERIOUSLY slacking in blogging lately.  I was looking back at our blog from when I was pregnant with Josiah and see that I blogged EVERY doctor appointment, movement, extra gas, you name it.  Not so with this little one.  I guess that's what happens when you have another little one running around that needs your attention so you can't spend all day noticing every little thing:-)  I am 28 weeks along now (due May 1) and baby is VERY active.  Much more so than Josiah so that is a bit frightening given the level of energy he has now!  I haven't gained any weight yet with this pregnancy so I'm happy about that!  Basically, we're cooking along just great!  The next big step is to get the office moved downstairs so that Josiah's big boy room can be completed and he can move before Baby F2 makes his/her appearance and needs the nursery....we're working on it:-)  Speaking of Josiah, he is also doing great.  He continues to amaze us daily with his vocabulary and VERY active imagination.  His favorite thing to do these days is to "duct" which is short for conduct.  His favorite show is Little Einsteins and his favorite character is Leo who's special talent is conducting.  So there you have it:-)  He continues to "challenge" us to find any food that he will consistently eat.  Some days, his whole days caloric intake consists of a few bites of something and a glass of milk...and yet he still has more energy than Seth and I put together!  He is growing so we try not to fret too much....plus, the more we concentrate on making him eat, the more he rebels.  Ah well, remind me of this blog post when he is 15 and eating us out of house and home!  I completely missed blogging the holidays but in short, we were once again blessed to be surrounded by family and friends and had several fun gatherings!  I could go on and on but I'll sum it up in 4 words:  Food, food, fellowship and food.  I did manage to put together a video of Josiah from Christmas morning.  Let's just say that he definitely understood the present thing this year and boy was he excited!!  Take a look:

First Christmas present of 2011

Our very sweet neighbors, Skip and Barb, always remember Josiah at holiday times and usually give him a wonderful present from Hallmark.  The first gift made noise, the second and third made noise AND moved which in Josiah's book is a MAJOR plus!  Well, they outdid themselves this year...this one sings, moves AND light's up!!  Check it out...

Play date with the Rogers girls

Our dear friends, Karl and Kristin Rogers, have adorable (almost) two year old twin girls and the other day they came over to play for a few hours with Josiah.  Having 3 toddlers running around the house could cause stress but not so this day!  The three of them had a blast and giggled and ran and played the whole time with only a few minor "bumps"  It was a great reminder of how uninhibited children are and how they find joy in everything...even cooking plastic lizards in a fake microwave or wearing bags on their heads as hats.  Jesus loves the little children and it's easy to see why....

Think Karl and Kristin will see this expression
again...I suspect we can pull this photo out
in about 10 years and the answer will be yes:-)

Cheeeeeeese!!

Sophia chillaxin with her juice

Jocelyn was the more serious of the three for the
evening...here she is catching up on her reading

"How do you like my hat?"

Two peas in a pod!!

Playtime!

We had a rare evening at home with just the three of us the other night so playtime ensued:-)  I hurried to edit this and get it on the Blog just for you Kaidance, Madilyn and Aubrey!!  Enjoy:-)

What has the little man been up to?

I haven't posted about Josiah in a few weeks so I thought I'd update you all on what he's been doing these days.  Mainly, he's perfecting the art of being two years old.  A friend from church taught him to say "I'm 2, and I'm good at it!" a few weeks ago and boy was she right!  He is mainly a happy go lucky kind of guy...unless he is short on sleep and then LOOK OUT!  Wailing, gnashing of teeth and crying abound!  I don't think he is unique in this development, in fact most parents probably can relate.  I can't complain too much because a good dose of sleep restores order and all is well again:-)  He talks NON-stop and by non-stop, I mean, from the time he opens his eyes to the time he closes them again, he is narrating life.  One positive to this is that I don't have to be in the same room with him to know what he's up to, he tells me:-)  Overall he is a sweet little guy and keeps us laughing all the time with his antics and commentary on life.  Here are a couple pictures and a video to illustrate further.

He discovered "chock-whet" cake and hasn't looked
 back...the boy has a sweet tooth just like his daddy!

Doing his best Forrest Gump impression

Addison Marie turns three!

Our niece, Addie, turned three years old on September 16th and we were all invited to her house on the 18th to celebrate.  Addie sure knows how to throw a party, there was yummy food, fun games and of course, CAKE:-) She is a sweet little girl and I can't believe she is three already, time moves too fast these days!  Here is a little video of the day, we all had so much fun!!

Future in medicine?

Josiah has become quite interested in 'owies' over the past few weeks.  Any mark on his body now requires a bandaid.  For example, I had to reapply not one, not two, but THREE bandaids to a 10 day old "wound" just this morning.  Luckily, I found multicolored bandaids at the Dollar Tree so this new habit isn't costing us $10 for 3 Lightning McQueen bandaids as was previously the case.  Anywho, his concern has now spread beyond his own "health" and on to anyone else who might have a mark on them.  He frequently gets a concerned look on his face, points to a freckle on my arm and asks "You get hurt Mommy?"  And when I try to assure him that no, I am in fact just fine, he shakes his head and states "No Mommy, you hurt"  OK buddy, sure, I'll apply a brightly colored 'noragne' bandaid to my freckle.  Awesome.  The other day when Henry was over for a play date, Josiah noticed that he had a 'wound' on his knee and was very concerned...no need to call CPS, the scrape was at least a week old and almost healed but Josiah thought differently:

Friedt Family Vacation 2011

Well, I started with over 350 pictures but was able to whittle them down to a manageable amount...still too many to just post the pics though so here is the slideshow instead:-)  As you'll see, we had a really fun time and amazing weather!  A BIG THANK YOU to Jay and Renee for letting us crash at their "cabin" (read: beautiful lake home) for the week, we appreciate it so much!!!  Josiah is still talking about going on "bay-cation" at the "caven" and wants to know when we can go back:-)

Becker Vacation 2011

Normally I would blog all about our trip and put together a slide show of the 1000 pictures (not an exageration, there are 1000) but my sister Robin has written a beautiful and oh so very true post on her Blog complete with a wonderful slide show so this year, I shall defer to her.  Nice work Robin, thanks for the wonderful words, pictures and memories!!  And now without further ado......click here.

Time flies when you're having fun

I haven't been very good at keeping up with blogging the past few weeks but time is flying!  We went on our first summer vacation (blog post about that to follow) and Josiah turned 2!!  I will be blogging about that later also...still waiting on pics from a few people:-)  In the meantime, here are a few pics and a video that show what Josiah's been up to...

Bedtime snack with Daddy

Drum or stool?  Dual purpose in Josiah's world!

Josiah helped set the table, Froggie was overseeing
but clearly dozed off on the job...tsk tsk.

Peeling a "norange"

All decked out for the holiday weekend!

GLEE LIVE!!! Momma's night out:-)

My sister-in-law Blair, one of our besties Kristin, and I went to see Glee Live courtesy of our FABULOUS husbands who surprised us with tickets!!!  We got them a couple of months ago and have been impatiently waiting since then to go to the show.  For those of you who don't watch (you should!) it's a sarcastic comedic story of a high school glee club.  For more info, click here.  We decided to make it mommy's night out and started with a cocktail at a fancy establishment called The Bank:

Blair's fancy drink "Blue Dolphin on the Rocks"
AKA  water with ice.  Thanks for DD'ing Blair!!

My fancy drink: Blueberry Mojito

Kristin's fancy drink:  Mai Tai

Do we look like tourists??  Yeah, we thought so 

Next up, it was over to Huberts where we were treated like royalty thanks to Abbie Snell, Intern Extraordinaire!  On the way, we saw the tour buses:

Surprisingly, the cast did not rush out to meet us when we
knocked on the bus windows, they must not have recognized us.  Weird.

On to Huberts for dinner!

There we go, a true "fancy" drink for Blair...Shirley Temple

Me and Abber Dabs....LOVE this girl!!!

Momma's Night Out!!

Huberts is conveniently IN the Target Center where the show was so we simply had to walk a few feet through some glass doors and voila, we were there!  Since it was "act like a teenager" night for us, we hit up the souvenir stand first:

Clearly, we weren't the only ones who NEEDED Glee paraphernalia

Cute. Cute. Cute.

Then it was SHOWTIME!!  We had uh-MAZ-ing seats:

It was a really great night, thanks Seth, Brian and Karl for sending your grateful wives on such a fun adventure!!!  And thank you to my girls Blair and Kristin for making the night SOOO much fun!!!  Here is a video "mash-up" of the evening's concert....it's a bit long but if you are a Glee and/or music fan, you'll enjoy it:-)

Busy Birthday weekend

We had two birthday celebrations to go to this weekend and had a blast at both.  Josiah's favorite part is the singing and of course, the cake and ice cream!  We ended the weekend at Nana and Papa Mike's with bathtime and a diaper dance:-)

Grandma gave Addie and Josiah kites as an early Easter present so we decided to bust them out and see how they flew....pretty no?

"Come on 'Siah!"

Hangin' with Uncle Josh

Happy Birthday Papa!!!

New skills ala Maddy:-)

Happy 6th Birthday Jack!!

Happy 6th Birthday Kaylie!!

"Can we have cake now??"

Seth is Jack's godfather...many of you will remember him from
our wedding where he was the VERY enthusiastic ring bearer:-)

Cake...dominated!

All clean after my bath in Auntie Nykki's big tub!

"Let's do the Diaper Dance!"

Sweet moves boys!

All PJ'd up and ready for bed!!

New discovery...Potato Head!!

Hand Washing 101

One of Josiah's favorite activities of late is washing his hands....and by "washing his hands" I mean splashing around in the sink and playing in the water:-)  Watch and learn....

Visiting Auntie Nykki

Auntie Nykki had another surgery on Friday to help straighten out her "windswept" left leg and release some of the intense tone in that hip so Josiah and I headed up there Saturday morning to visit.  We had a full car because Olivia, Grandma Greseth and Grandma Sissy all came with us too!  Nykkole was VERY sleepy but seemed comfortable and overall pretty content!  Josiah was happy to see her and of course Nana and Papa!  He was also excited to see that there was a small carnival set up for patients and visitors and he got to play the games:-)  For the first 20 minutes or so he was the only child there so he got plenty of attention and what kid doesn't eat that up??  Here are some pictures and a short video from our visit:

"Hi Nykki!"

Grandma Greseth helped Josiah find all the cool things on the mural, including a chair "just like Nykki's!"

"Will a 'boon (balloon) help you Nykki?"

Nykkole and her personal nurse, Olivia...what would we do without Olivia???!!!

Nana sharing her crackers

This isn't the best quality photo but I LOVE the expressions on their faces!  This was right after Josiah loudly declared "Silly Papa!"

Giant Soccer!

Putting advice from Papa

Bowling pins bigger than Josiah!

Go Outside!

As is typical of February in MN, we were blessed with a few unseasonably warm days that melted a good portion of the snow that has been hanging around since December.  Josiah and I took full advantage of the warmest day (reached 50 degrees!) and went outside to play.  He was SO excited to be outside and asks several times a day now to go back out.  Unfortunately as is ALSO typical of February in MN, the cold and snow returned so we are stuck inside for a few more weeks unless I feel like dressing him up as Ralphie's little brother and heading out.  As you can see from this picture, he's no fan of the process either:

But it's all worth it once you're out in the "no" and can "twy it" and stomp around in it:

What a difference a few days makes:

Even though the Groundhog didn't see his shadow, it seems we are still going to have to endure at least 6 more weeks of winter anyway, ah well, we live in MN what do we expect??  Here is a little video to help pass the time:-)