Ok, so Matthew and William are both still alive... I have the pictures to prove it!

Here's one of true brotherly love... I think Matthew is onto something.


Now Matthew has things figured out... he's not having any part of this. William is still cool under pressure, smiling away..



And now the woman who keeps our family glued together.. my beautiful wife Lynn!



Enjoy!

Hey! My dad (John Horihan) came out! That completes the immediate family, they've all seen the cheese factory in Tillamook, the beach in Cannon Beach, Timberline Lodge, and Multnomah falls. For those of you who have come to visit and stay with us, you know excatly what I mean. For those of you that don't, you won't. Hint: Come and visit. For those of you who came to visit in our pre-house days, try it again. We have an actual guest bedroom. Ok, so not "really" a guest bedroom. Its really Matthew's bedroom, but he's still bunking in M&D's room. But hey, come out in the next month or so and you'll have a room all to yourself. Anyways, my parents enjoyed the trip out here, having fun with the scenery and with two Grandchildren. For all those grandparents out there, remember this: as the years go on, its more and more difficult to get all your grandkids together. This was one chance to have all the grandkids in the same room.

Ok, so you're probably thinking, "Hey, I see all my grandkids at once all the time!" Sure, you probably live in a big city in Illinois. :-)

Matthew is doing great. He's making all sorts of sounds, more grunting than anythign else, but we do get some sort of cooing when he's really happy. Other than that, its like "unnh... unnhh... mmmhh...nnnuhhh" You get the picture.

Its been really nice lately... native Oregonians call it the "February Fake-out". If you want to sound local in the PDX area, belly up to a bar, order a local microbrew, and say "I sure like this February fake-out, makes me glad I live in Or-gin and not in that California". You may or may not get a positive response. If you see ex-loggers / farm hands / local-locals, you'll get something good. If you see techies / college students / parents, they won't really care. Anyways, we've enjoyed the sunshine.

Lynn is doing well, given she gets about 2 hours a sleep each night. Kinda rough. I like to think that sleep will return in 2 short years. She doesn't seem to think that is really funny. :-(

William is doing well too. He likes to ask "why". I can't tell the kid a story anymore without a dozen or so questions afterwards. God forbid that I don't tie up a story line within the story. He remembers everything... now something that used to work great, like "No, that CD is in Mommy's car" (and vice versa) will end in flames when I'm in Mommy's car. ("No daddy, you said yesterday it was in Mommy's car"). Crap. The quick distract is coming to its end.

So I know you all want pictures, but they're on my camera. I don't want to let this big bunch of text sit here on the computer while I go get it, so I'll post this and then go git-r-done with the camera & post pictures online.

So far, not too bad. Although whenever Lynn leaves me alone with the two of them, I do get a bit uneasy... and they do have a tendency to cry at the same time. Why? I don't know.

What we have realized is that William really was a piece of cake. Now that we have the ability to "look back" by seeing how Matthew acts, we really are wondering what all the fuss was about. I believe its just the shock of becoming parents for the first time. Everything is different... and you're like "Wow, this is tough." But really? No. It gets tougher but you don't notice anymore. Your baby that used to just sit there now starts to run around/away, talk back, throw tantrums, wash your car with rocks, and have their own opinions.

Now we have this little baby. He cries, you check him. Diaper? Change it. Needs to be burped? Burp 'em. Hungry? Hand him to Lynn. That's pretty much it. Low maintenance. Pretty much all your effort sees results, or you get a high ROI. If you're having your first baby and are thinking "wow, this sucks" (at 4AM) fear not. Soon you will sleep all night, but your days will be filled with chasing whomever around the store and/or running around church.

The rain let up again today, giving us a hint of sunshine. It was nice to head out into the backyard and throw a ball around with William.

Forgot to mention that Ryan was out here. He had a good time and enjoyed what Oregon had to offer. Maybe we'll get him back to finish up a hike we started.

My parents are coming out in the end of Feb, should be fun. This will be my mom's 3rd trip and my dad's first. We had to buy a house before he would come out, so now there's no excuse! If anybody that has been out here has any good ideas on where to take him, let me know.

I realize that I've been lax with the pictures. I'm trying to get up another picture page so I can just throw a bunch on there. This would allow others to post them as well. It'll be cool once its done. I also have new pictures of Matthew other than his 10 min old pictures.

William is 3 today! Yikes! Could it be so long ago that he was born? It doesn't seem possible (although I have a hard time remembering what it was like not being a parent). Today William had a great time with his friends. We had a bowling party and had a Cars cake designed by Lynn. William thanks all for his birthday presents!

Ok! Lets see here. January 10th. Quick recap of what happened in the last few days.

1. Lynn & Matthew came home
2. Ruth Pedrick (MIL) came out
3. Jason's been working from home / taking time off / back at work

Matthew has been a pretty good sleeper.. unfortunately for us its only during the day. At night he's all about eating, or at least trying to eat. Not wanting to be left out, William is also getting up at night more often. Yikes. Only 18 more years.

None the less, its lots of fun to have two kids. I'm not seeing the full impact quite yet. I'm sure when Matthew reaches that point when he decides to take a stand against the tyrany of his older brother and goes head-to-head (mano-y-mano, toe-to-toe, face-to-face, etc) and starts fighting, I'll start to understand the true bliss that only one child can bring.

Anyways, we're alive. Stay tuned for more pictures.