the town of or

We love Kitt yes we do! We love Kitt, how 'bout you!? Kitt - thanks for fixing our blog....it's awesome!

Lisa has added lots of pictures of Jake in his online photo album including his first time in a big boy swing, and his first time in a canoe:

One of the fringe benefits of receiving a large donation from Safeco is that you get to go on-field before a game and receive a "big check" in front of the fans. OK, so the Mariners are the worst team in the big leagues this year...but still nothing beats a thumbs-up (hoofs-up?) from the Mariner Moose.

We saw these two otters, playing on a dock in Port Townsend, WA. Then on the way home, we saw this bald eagle in Poulsbo, WA. Quite a nature day!

Yesterday, on the 623rd day of his life (20+ months old), Jake did something we weren't sure was possible. He went an entire day without crying once! (Well, at least he didn't cry in the morning or evening with us - it's entirely possible he cried at daycare during the day).

It's a first! To make sure it didn't become a trend, he kicked off this morning crying when his Dad changed his diaper.

IslandWood held its summer staff party this week. We hired the "Bubble Man" to entertain the kids.

After the show, he told me that the weather was perfect (humid with cloud cover) for creating some of the biggest bubbles he has ever made!

One of Jake's favorite activities is to play with his Cheerios book. The game works with Mommy or Daddy placing Cheerios on various pages of the book, and then he laughs and eats them up!

Despite the fact that this book was a gift from his grandparents, I'm not sure some of the text is appropriate for children. How did the editor miss this?! :-)

It's so cool to see the constant development/growth of our little guy. Jake learned to wave (i.e. hello/goodbye) this week. He has started noticing and exploring himself in front of mirrors. He continues to be the most ticklish boy in the world (full of giggles and belly laughs). And, he LOVES reading with us - he even adeptly turns his own pages. One particularly interesting thing we've noticed is that he turns black and white pages of a book much faster than the colorful pages.

On the way into work today, I heard a story on NPR indicating that smoking of cigarettes is down considerably in China over the last few years - down to 350 million smokers! That's considerably more Chinese who smoke than the entire U.S. population (around 300 million). Apparently more than half of adult men in China are regular smokers. Zoiks!

Growing up, when asked questions like "Did you remember to pack the ___________?" my father always responded "Oh no, I sure wish I had the piano with me" (implying that the aforementioned critical item was left on the piano). Today, Lisa and Jake took the ferry to join me in Seattle so that we could go to the Passport Office and apply for Jake's first passport. I brought the forms (pre-filled out to save us time), and cute passport-sized photos of Jake (funny to think they'll be used for five years when he'll change so much), directions to the office, and even my passport to use as an ID for his application. But, I forgot a crucial item - Jake's birth certificate to show that he indeed exists. An hour later - after a run around downtown to the County Courthouse - I acquired a new copy of his birth certificate, and all was saved. I sure wish I had the piano!