Just an observation, nothing more.

These pajamas are the same jammies as these:




Observe that Jack weighs the same in each photo, but has grown nearly a FOOT in between. Normal? I think not. Giants. I will be surrounded by giants.






Meanwhile, Claire is gorgeous.

She has started winning hearts on the Eastside [said as gangsta] with her newest trick

Cheers, HR

Party like it's 1999...


Had some fun this last week. Jack's best bud Owen came over to play, the two pretended to nap. They were really more about having fun! Both LOVE cars, cars, cars.

Claire was introduced to some of Mommy's dearest friends and former Purdue roommates at a Friday night party. Claire did very well, at Jack's first party with them he slept through the whole thing sitting next to a speaker blasting Beatie Boys. Claire was no exception, but did peek out for a little while to show off her beautiful baby blues.



I guess it was a big week for parties because we followed Friday night up with a Tuesday birthday party with our buddy Cooper. It was at this place that sells swingsets etc. They rent out their showroom for parties. Check out this mad man:


Jack and Mackey had a great time on the swings. I must have taken a dozen pictures before getting one where they were both looking at the camera.






Claire got down with her bad self too!



(Note: No infants were physically harmed in the making of this photo. We are merely trying to provide each of them with an ample supply of things to gripe about later!)









And Happy, Happy Birthday Cooper! It sure has been fun watching you grow "Dash". Love ya!

A new day



We have lift off!!! Yeah. New camera is up and running and WOW, I now can load directly from the camera to the computer or straight to the web!! Yowza! We could never do that with our old camera!! Maybe Jack did us a favor by putting it down. Whenever I wanted to take images from the camera and do anything, it involved a trip to the local CVS to stand and load the images to a Kodak picture cd. Well not any more!

I do want to give a "holla back" to my in-laws. They gave us the camera as we were awaiting the arrival of Jack and it was a modern marvel, especially to me, a member of the technologically challenged. The only problem with our new camera is that it is wicked small by comparison and sometimes I feel like I am bumbling around with a tiny toy camera, whereas the old one wouldn't fit in a pocket. The new one also provides over twice the image quality, but I am sure it will be obsolete by next wednesday.





We went to dinner on Sunday evening where Jack was able to continue his love affair with ketchup. He asks for it on his waffles these days; which after careful consideration I still say no to, but I do consider it. We have gotten to the point where we have to ration it out or he will just throw caution to the wind and eat ketchup by the handful.


In other Jack related news, we have finally found something that will hold his attention other than the little creature referred to as a fictional, red tree sloth who refuses to use pronouns by my favorite blogger (check her out at www.dooce.com-- warning: may contain strong language and content). The boy actually sits still to watch baseball!! If you turn the channel during commercial he gets absolutely militant as though you created the commercial break just to get his dander up. He even watches it the same way I do, head cocked to the side, mouth slightly agape with no link to the outside world. He doesn't hear you when you talk to him either!!

I am attempting to phase he who shall not be named out. Wish me luck. Hope all is well with all of you. Claire is doing wonderfully. Eat, sleep, poop [repeat]. Although sometimes it is Eat, poop, sleep [repeat]. (Note the above picture was taken as Manny was hitting a rocket over the green monster.)

Hasta, HR

What a beautiful baby... is it yours?


Our wonderful friend Nicole Wallen took pictures of the kids to mark Jack turning 2 and for birth announcements. Relax, you probably haven't been forgotten. The announcements are on order and we plan to mail them as soon as we get them back. Anyway, here are a couple of the pictures...

Don't the kids look gorgeous?? I can hardly believe they are ours? Well, then again Jack does have my abnormally large skull and poor attitude when tired, so that is a dead give away that he is mine. For that matter, when he and Jeremy are together it is downright creepy how much they look alike, yep definitely ours! Claire looks sooo much like Jack, I will confess...I put a bonnet on him last night to get a Claire preview and found "her" to be stunning! We made our first solo trip to the Children's museum on Friday. Claire was an angel and slept the ENTIRE 4 hours we were there! Man, did I luck out with this one! Jack had a grand ol' time and Jeremy was able to get away and meet us for lunch.

We have a full schedule for the week. Jack's buddy Owen came over for a play date today, tomorrow Jack goes to daycare to hangout with his ladies, Wednesday to the pool with some friends, Thursday to the museum again, and Friday for a day at the park. We are enjoying some beautiful weather and don't want to miss a moment! Take care! HR

Okay, okay, okay... we know. We should call more, write more, and share more pictures. It has been about a week since our last post, but the Rochford family has been dealing with some digital camera issues, starting with Jack spiking our "old" camera like a football just before we left the hospital with a steady progression to "Memory Stick Issues" with our new camera. It is all getting worked out due to the wonderful manager at HH Gregg. He agrees that we aren't idiots and it is the camera, so we get a free upgrade to a different model tomorrow. We have managed a few pictures though, such as this one of Claire as a burrito wrapped in her favorite blankey from Nana B and Jack showing off his new mohawk .


Jack is my little helper (he helped with Claire's 1st bath) and when he feels like it, helps me care for Claire. Please remember he is VERY much a two year old with all the idiosyncracies that come along with the age. He is enjoying the exploration of cause and effect (example, if I ignore my mother's pleas, what effect will that have????) We have been suffering through dueling evening revelry cries from Jack and Claire. Claire, I get...she eats every couple of hours or so, but Jack has us confused and EXHAUSTED. I took him to the mall today because it was raining and I wanted him to stretch his legs a bit. I swear it was like I was watching his Uncle Trent run the 400. He ran lap after lap after LAP, and I could swear I saw him lean on the turns. Anyway, he lost the battle today and is still napping. Hope all is well. When we get our new new camera, we will post a ton of pictures.
Jack is working hard on his first post and we will publish that later in the week. Have a good one. Love from all. HR

More pictures...!

Hello all,

Jack would like to introduce you to his new baby sister...Claire Catherine Rochford. She was born on Saturday, July 1st at 11:59am. Heather went all natural yet again...she is a trooper and did a wonderful job! We were scheduled to be induced at 6am that morning, but Claire decided that she didn't want to wait that long and H. went into labor just after 4am. She labored on her own until 10:30am when the doctor broke her water at 8cm and Claire was born at 11:59am. As Jack looked just like his Daddy, I think Claire looks more like her Mommy. I have included some pictures below. I hope that you enjoy them! We hope to introduce you all to Claire very soon!

Jack's website is "under construction" and I wanted to get pictures posted for everyone across the world to see, so I am giving this blog a try. If it doesn't work, we will figure something else out!!!