Baby James

James Thomas Robertson was born on Saturday, 23 July 2011 at 9:19 AM.  The labor and delivery went smoothly, despite James weighing in at 10 lbs. 3.7 oz and 21 inches.  Both Janelle and James are doing great.  Alan is being an awesome big brother.  We'll have more details soon, but wanted to let people see some pictures before the new babe is old news :-)

Swimming and Sandcastles

Here are some pictures from our attempts to keep cool this summer!  Actually, the weather hasn't been as hot as we've expected.  We have an occasional hot day or two, but it has usually cooled off nicely in the evenings, and we've had some cooler days as well.  That being said, I am constantly very hot, but I guess that's being pregnant in the summer.  Our basement is very cool and is my favorite place to be in our house. :)

We have a splash park down the street from us, that we've visited a few times, but Alan isn't really into the spraying water.   Funny because he loved standing under the pouring water at Seven Peaks last summer... must be a new phase.  Anyway he has much more fun splashing and wading in pools and we've spent several days with our neighbors in their kiddie pools!  As you can see they have lots of fun together!

Alan, Violet, and Lucia in the little pool

Hanging out on the front porch...

And deciding to share.  So cute. :)

This Saturday we decided to go to the beach.  Alan was very excited to play in the sand and the water, and repeated that phrase the entire time we drove there, looked for a parking spot, and walked to the water.  There was also a sand sculpting competition that we thought would be fun to check out.  So despite being 9 months pregnant we braved the beach.

Alan was a little nervous at the beginning...

We tried to make a little sand sculpture ourselves, but Alan had the most fun knocking it down.

Getting braver and going out farther

And as you can see, Alan ended up having quite a fun time.

And here are some pictures from the sand sculpting competition.  You can see the man working on it in the first picture.  They were pretty much amazing.  These are just water and sand, and they spray a diluted elmer's glue solution on the top to prevent the wind from blowing it away.  And the turtle's shell in the last picture is hollow.  I have no idea how they did that.  Pretty incredible.  All in all a very fun day.

4th Weekend Fun

Well, I decided I better hurry and get some pictures from the 4th of July weekend up before they are too outdated and before the blog is overrun with pictures of little Robertson Jr.  We had an extremely fun (and busy!) 4th of July weekend.  On Saturday, the 2nd, we went downtown to the Common and Public Garden.  They had some Colonial Militia and British Redcoats staging various demonstrations throughout the day.  We just thought it would be fun to check it out and spend some time downtown.  On the 4th itself we went to a community day at a park near our house, which was perfect for Alan, and went to some local fireworks as well.  All in all a super fun weekend.

A few Colonials at Boston Common

I actually remembered my camera this time to get this shot!

On the Swan Boats

There were tons of ducks, which Alan loved, plus the swans.  We even saw several nests and a turtle.

Frog Pond (different from the lagoon above) is a little one-foot swimming pool that all the kids loved.  We didn't know that it was just a free and open little wading pool in the summer, so we weren't prepared for swimming.  But we saved it for last and Alan had a blast!

Then, on the 4th itself, Alan helped to make/eat this strawberry blueberry cheesecake.

"Cheese!"  He usually refuses to do that these days.

 

This is at the city sponsored family fun day at the park.  As you can tell, Alan loved the bounce house.  He would have probably stayed in there all day if we had let him.

"Dat Tun!"  aka  That's fun!  (repeated about 100 times as he is bouncing)

We had some lunch and then waited for a trolley ride

There it comes!!

On board!  It  took us to the top of a hill that overlooks the city.

A very fun little ride, and Alan loved it.

When the line for the obstacle course died down, we let Alan give that a go as well.   

Alan just came over and gave me the caption for this pic:  "Daddy make hamburgers, too hot."  In reality they were delicious for our little 4th BBQ.

A bunch of people from our ward met up for fireworks here in Waltham as well.  The kids were able to run around for a couple of hours before the fireworks began, and it was a little warm, but a nice night.  Here we are before the fireworks, and Alan with a mouthful of pretzels.

Fireworks!!

And Alan's reaction to the fireworks.  Turns out to be very similar to his reaction to haircuts. :)  Overall, not a huge fan of them, but he did better than we thought.  The crying was on and off (favoring the on side), and he was the biggest fan of them being all done.  In fact, he has said that to me every day since... "Fireworks all done."