Happy birthday to us!

This past week we celebrated three birthdays in our household: Grandma's on August 9th, mine on August 11th, and Brian's today, August 13th. This year's birthdays were the best ever since we got to celebrate with our precious Joey.

On Thursday, Grandma celebrated her birthday with a game of mah-jong - her first game since Joey was born. To get her ready for the game, she got a brand new haircut on Wednesday night (next time you see her, make sure to tell her how great she looks).

On Saturday night, we had a family dinner.

On Sunday night, Brian and I cleaned ourselves up and went out to dinner and a movie.

We rounded out the celebration tonight with some fancy cupcakes and some obligatory photos with the birthday candles.

Bouncing baby boy

Joey got his safari jumperoo a few weeks ago but has really gotten good at the bouncing part in the last week or so. Here are a couple of still photos that show how happy he is when he's playing around in it followed by a video we took this morning of him hopping around.

Joey donned his first Longhorn apparel this weekend (I know, I'm a horrible Longhorn mommy) in honor of this upcoming football season and also in honor of his cousin Scott who will be starting the UT MBA program this fall.

4-month well check

Joey had his 4-month well check this morning and bravely endured another round of vaccination shots. He now weighs in at 16 pounds, 12 ounces (we're back in the 90th percentile after dropping to the 75th percentile during his struggles with acid reflux a few weeks ago), and is 25 1/4 inches long.

Here is a photo of Joey and daddy all set and ready to venture out in the sun for a trip to the mailbox.

The Broken Bone

This weekend was the annual Tschoepe Family Reunion at The Broken Bone Ranch in Medina, Texas. This year was Joey's first year in attendance and although we only made it from Friday to Saturday afternoon (sleeping issues for Joey = sleeping issues for mommy and daddy), you can see from the pictures below that Joey really enjoyed himself and is already looking forward to next year when he'll be able to run around and swim with the big kids!

Joey napped during the entire drive from San Antonio to Medina on Friday afternoon. When we arrived at "The Bone", he decided to do a little more napping under the shade of a big tree.

Here we are on Saturday morning checking out the beautiful scenery.

Playing with cousin Beth and some crazy ducks.

Relaxing creekside on the hammock with cousin Beth.

Rocking away on the porch of the Pioneer Pad where we stayed.

Joey and Da have a staredown.

Goofing around with Oma, cousin Bobby and Aunt Janet.

Enjoying some alone time in the grass.

Oh yeah, while Brian was playing in the water, he lost his wedding ring (it only took all of 2 1/2 years). Here he is with his dad and their valiant effort to find the darn thing, but it just wasn't meant to be...

Piano prodigy