disclaimer and update

So my dislaimer is that I really do love Sam just as much as Max and the fact that there are 5 times as many photos of Max is not reflective of my affection. I realize that many of the posts focus on Max but that's simply because 2 year olds are just more entertaining than less-than-one year olds. Well, you may say, there are thousands of pictures of Max when he was that age. Yes, that is true, but we didn't know any different then and I had much more time and energy before Sam came along. The first time the first child unloads a bookshelf it's cute and entertaining. The first time the second one does it is purely frustrating - very sad but I've just had to come to terms with the fact that this is the lot of a second child - especially one so close in age to the first.

This is not to say that Sam is a boring child - quite to the contrary. He is serious entertainment. One of the best things about Sam is that he does not know he is a baby. He fully believes he should be included in anything that is going on and that he can do anything that Max can. He loves his big brother and seems to want to be just like him. Hence if Max is throwing himself off some piece of furniture Sam will do everything in his power to follow him up there and do the same. If Max is being ticked on the floor, he will throw himself down next to him and giggle as he waits to be tickled himself. The two of them will play outside for hours together. Usually this involves Max filling the empty swimming pool up with mud, both of them climbing in and sliding down the slide into the dirt piles. They both laugh. Whenever Max goes outside now he looks back and says "Sammy coming too?". Sam invariably speed crawls for the door before anyone can block his exit. Max is still clumsy and still makes Sam cry from time to time but generally they play much better together and have a good old time. It is really fun to see and makes us excited for the future with the two little buddies.

Sam tries so hard to keep up that he has started walking already. He's not even 11 months old yet. He is still unstable but can make it across the entire room now if nothing is under his feet and Richard doesn't cross his path. He can't walk when he is overly excited either. Max is quite entertained by the bipedal Sam and will exclaim "Sammy, walking". We never meant for Sam to be called "Sammy" but that is what Max calls him and he says it so affectionately that it's become one of his names along with "Sam-o" (short for Sam Mateo) and "Tam-o"(because for a long time Max couldn't say S).

Sam continues in the 100th percentile for his weight and height. He eats almost anything - except meat. I think his favourite food at the moment is tomatoes from the garden. He goes wild for them. He has plenty of hair and has had his front 8 teeth for a couple of months now. He's just planning on catching up with Max as fast as he can. He also still looks uncannily like the younger pictures of Max. Max will see pictures of himself as a baby and gets very frustrated when you try to tell him it isn't Sam. We have a couple of photo books of him that he flips through pointing out Sam in all the pictures not finding it at all strange that the little girl he correctly identifies as Rylee is a baby too. I can't help but wonder if they will look like twins in a couple of years. So far Sam's hair is still straight but Max's didn't curl until he was about 22 months old -and look at him now.

Perhaps the most notable things about Sam, besides his size, are his loud voice and determination which often go hand in hand when he does not get what he was going for. Whether he is happy, sad or in between Sam is seriously LOUD. Oh, and he growls a lot too.

Max get's skinnier by the day. He is way too busy to eat. He exists largely on bell peppers and pickles plus the several gallons of liquid he consumes a day - he got the thirst of his father. He talks in several word sentences now, though the words that go together are not always conventional. He has just started to use "I" instead of "my" in sentences like "I like that" or "I'll get it". His favourite things to do are still digging and playing with tools and also baseball - he swings tha bat like a natural and can occasionally hit a moving ball. He is truly obsessed with mowers and motorbikes. Matt thinks it's funny that he calls tham motorbikes and not motocycles. He'll hear a motorbike and say "aaaagh motobike..........my see it. Brian motobike.... max motobike too. Daddy has motobike...No". That's the one thing that makes Daddy less cool. Though Daddy does mow a lot - especially during this wet kentucky summer. Max has a little plastic mower which he hijacked from his friend Lucas that he pushes around a lot. If we happen to walk past a store selling mowers, such as Ace Hardware, or we are in Lowe's he demands some time to browse the selection.

Very fun little boys. We can never complain of not enough to do in a day.

Matt just went back to school for his third year and is now more than half way through dental school. Sarah is starting to feel human again as Sam is finally sleeping through the night (until 6a.m.)at least 50% of the time. Fingers crossed it lasts.