Jess and Jocie in the Morning

Jocie's Hair

Here are some cute shots of Jocie the day after Halloween while her hair still looked a bit freakish (the red is from the hair dye we used to make her look like The Little Mermaid's Ariel).

Julie's First Birthday (with Family)

Julie enters the kitchen on her birthday day. Jenny always works very hard to make sure each child's birthdays are very special and memorable. The streamers are a trademark of her dedication to this. Here Julie stops to play with them before going to sit down for breakfast.

A family shot. Julie decided she didn't really want to wear the birthday hat.

The "Birthday Princess" wearing a hat that says 'Fun to be One!". The hat didn't last long before she took it off, but it looks cute for these few minutes.

Mom poses for a quick snap with Julie.

The entire family watches as Julie opens her presents.

She thought her big present was pretty cool

Julie's new "ride"! From one of her favorite Disney Shows "Little Einsteins".

Julie heads out for her first "test drive" in her new car.

You can see the excitement in her eyes!

Julie's initial birthday cake (Jenny made a much better one for her party).

Mother and daughter share a quick glance as we all sing "Happy Birthday" to little Julie.

And now... for some cake!!!

.... and more... (shoveling it in)...

.... oh just look at all that mess...

One happy (but sugar comatose) 1 year old baby.

Julie opens more of her presents later that night as we all headed out for dinner.

Fall Portraits of Julie

These are some shots for an impromptu shoot we did in the front yard with Julie. The perfect timing for our little maple tree had just dropped all of it's beautiful colored leaves.

Julie and her Balloon

Early on her birthday morning, here is Julie having fun with a balloon as she gets ready for a fun and amazing day (more pictures to come).

Halloween with the Kids

Jocie rides along with Julie in her wagon as they trolled the neighborhood looking for good candy.

Megan dropped by to see the kids too

Darth Vader (Cameron) stands beside Mario (Joey) and Luigi (Nick)... an odd assortment.

Another shot with Megan, this time with Joey.

JL was very festive on this occasion.

Julie was our beautiful little flower for Halloween. She was a little trooper the whole night. Even though it was REALLY cold, she stayed up with me and helped hand out candy to the 300+ trick-or-treaters we had that night.

Julie and her Bottle

I had to post these today after Julie SCREAMED at JL the other night when she tried to feed her. Julie has decided to ween herself from mom in favor of her warm bottles of milk instead.... Ms. Independent (look out Jess and Jocie, you've got competition bringing up the rear of the Pike Family Tree).

Here she is enjoying her newfound pastime (when not climbing stairs that she has yet to learn to descend).

Julie's Bottle

Jocie Thinks

She was staring out the window daydreaming when I caught this. I just love the lighting on this capture.

The Kids Halloween Costumes

Joey as "Mario" from one of his favorite computer games (and he coordinated with some of his friends on the costume) and Jess as a "Kitty Cat"....

At the park with Jocie and Julie

On a recent Sunny Sunday morning, while Joey and Jess were at religious school, JL and I took the little girls out to a park to enjoy the last bits of warm weather.