3 Years Old Pix | Julie Marie Portraits

I can't hardly believe that my first baby turned 3 this past Monday.  It just amazes me as to how time flies the older I get!  Anyway, Jake got his haircut tonight. When we got home, he grabbed his mower, and I grabbed my camera.  I bribed him to smile at me with some chocolate kisses and told him to jump and run...of course he was more than willing to do that!   These have got to be some of my favorite pix ever of him.  They depict him to a T!  He is my strong-willed, independent, loving little wild man that doesn't sit still unless he's reading a book or playing on the ipad.  Oh, how I love him!!!

JET is 3 Months Old Today | Julie Marie Portraits | Chicago Children's Photographer

 I can hardly believe that my little Johnny aka John John aka John Emerson is 3 months old today.  He has brought us so much joy and happiness! He has the best personality...so happy, smiles so much and can be just as stubborn as his brother!  We're still trying to get a nap routine down, but night time is going great!  I, also, can't believe that he started rolling from his tummy to his back just today!  Where is the time going....we need to slow it down just a bit!  Aside from Johnny being 3 months old, we are preparing for Jakers to turn 3 very soon ...how can that be! 

Big brother Jake is FINALLY enjoying his baby brother!  He loves to talk to him and make him laugh!

 And we love our Blabla dolls...thanks, Aunt Jiji!

Happy January | Julie Marie Portraits | Chicago Children's Photographer

Hope everybody is having a great January!  We are enjoying our downtime so much along with all of our visitors that have been here!    I really didn't have much to say except that I wanted to pop in to say hi and of course, post some pix of my boys!  To give you an update, big brother Jake is starting to acknowledge his brother somewhat.....i guess the good thing is that Jake does not want to be near his brother, so he's not bothering him at all!  However, I was able to get some funny pix of the two of them yesterday.  Also, yesterday Johnny was 4 weeks....my how the time is flying!

One of my favorite blogs did a picture like this below for every week of her daughter.  I, however, am going to do a monthly picture just to show how big he gets.

love, love, love this one...i'm not even sure what Jake is telling Johnny

and some fun pictures of my Jakers....2.5 years old and ornery as can be and so much fun!

Happy Birthday & Best Buds | Julie Marie Portraits | Chicago Children's Photographer

I just wanted to wish my dad a Happy, Happy Birthday tomorrow!  We wish we could be there to celebrate with him, but we were lucky enough to have some birthday cake with him this past Monday!  I can't even imagine what I'd do without him....he is the best dad without a doubt, and I owe him so much for all the help and work that he did for us this past week for our move (and my mom gets a shout out too for all the help)!  We love you dad, and hope you have the best birthday!!

If you can't tell, Jakey loves his Papa!  He's asked everyday this week if NanaPapa were coming to our new home when daddy got home from work, too!

And one more favorite from this week....Jakey and his best bud, Dexter!  Love those two!

We love Thursday mornings in our household because of....

Jake will sit and look out the window all morning just waiting for the garbage trucks to come by! :)

Happy 2nd Birthday to our Jakey Jake!

Happy, Happy 2nd Birthday to my handsome little guy today! 

It's funny how I think about how sad I was last year at this time with him turning one, but this year, I absolutely LOVE this age.  I love that he can now have conversations with us, tell us he loves us, sings his abc's, counts to 10, talks about all of his cousins and grandparents, talks about his friends, loves on his doggy, Dexter, plays with his cars and plays ball ALL OF THE TIME, uses his manners (pease, thanky, cuse me), feeds his doggy every day, LOVES to read books, sings lots of songs and most of all, I love those little kisses that he gives us and his armless hugs.  He has truly brought us more joy than we could have ever imagined!  We love you, Jakey Jake!  Happy Birthday little guy!

And here's his two year pic....

and his month by month picture April 2011-March 2012

Weekend Visitors | Julie Marie Portraits | Rochester, NY Vacation Photographer

We're so excited to have some visitors in this weekend...

Happy Weekend! | Julie Marie Portraits | Rochester, NY Photographer

Pretty in Pink | Julie Marie Portraits | Rochester, NY Children's Photographer

Hope you all are having a great week!  I wanted to share some photos of my gorgeous niece from this past weekend!  Can you believe she's only 4?  And check out her outfit....I would so wear that dress!  (I probably wouldn't look too cute in the tights, huh! )  She is absolutely beautiful and so sweet!  

And I had to share one from our Pittsburgh trip...Jakey with his cousins!  He had the best time seeing them!

Happy 2012! | Julie Marie Portraits | Rochester, NY Photographer

Happy New Year 2012, Everybody!  Hope you had a fabulous holiday season!  We got to spend Christmas in Ohio with my family, and we had the best time!  It was so nice to be home and just relax....and let all of my family chase Jake around while my hubby and I just sat and watched! :)

As all of you know, we moved to Rochester in October, and everybody kept talking about the horrible winters that Rochester gets...well, for some reason, we must have brought them some good luck because we've had a really mild December and January thus far.  In fact, on New Year's day, Josh, Jake, Dexter and I went for our first 2012 walk outside.  It felt a little weird to be walking outside in 40+ degree weather on January 1st and no snow!

Which now brings us to today.....another incredibly warm day for January!  And, well, you guessed it...that meant time for some new updated photos of my on-the-go-at-all-times 21 month old little Jakers!  I must say...he really is impossible to photograph right now, but M&M's do the trick to make him stop in his tracks!  I'm thinking we need to buy stock in M&M's because he now knows his colors because of them, they've helped him calm down from the temper tantrums that seem to occur quite often, and we're hoping they'll help him with potty training when that begins (very soon)!

Jakers @ 21 months with his shaggy hair and blabla doll.  And check out Jake sporting a bowtie!  New favorite shirt from Somebubby Chapman Apparel.

 I'm not sure what he's doing, but this look sort of cracks me up!

 And without M&M's - this is what photos look like....no cooperation at all, but oh so fun! :)  Have a great weekend!

A Weekend Project?? | Julie Marie Portraits | Rochester, NY Photographer

Hope you all had a nice Thanksgiving!  We spent Thanksgiving in Pittsburgh and had a great time visiting with family!

I wanted to share with you what was going on in our neighborhood.  I'll give you a little background on it...we live in the Park Avenue area of Rochester, and we absolutely love it!  It has beautiful old homes and lots of restaurants and shops that we're able to walk to.  It's a very quaint area.  I especially love that Jake and I can walk to get a coffee and cookie everyday at the coffee shop just down the street!   Anyway, our neighborhood had their 18th Annual Park Avenue Holiday Open House.   I wasn't really sure what to expect, so I took my time on venturing out to check it out.  I was amazed....there were so many people down here and all of the merchants were open for folks to stop in and shop, eat, and just mingle.  

So, because I wasn't sure what to expect, I went out with out a camera, but I did have my iPhone and was able to get a few pix.

I think my favorite thing was this newspaper wreath that was displayed in a store's front window.  How fabulous is this!  We were walking by, and I stopped to check out the beautiful (very full) wreath in the window and realized it was made out of newspaper.  

Doesn't it look great?  The other side is a dress made out of newspaper.

I tried to get up close to see how it was made....I'm thinking this could possibly be a weekend project to try?

And this was too funny.....we had just walked down the street and we saw Tigger & Big Bird walking down the side walk.  Jake was excited, scared and not sure what to think.  He wasn't into talking to Tigger at all, but he was somewhat excited to tell Big Bird hi & bye.  As you can see, Jake is squinting in the photo...that's because my iPhone flash is soooooo bright.  It's not the best picture, but I think Big Bird & Tigger look great!

Just a glimpse of the traffic lined up down the street looking for parking.  

Next year, I will be prepared as I know what to expect, and I will be out there earlier to do some shopping!

Have a great weekend!

Gobble, Gobble Says the Turkey!

I thought we'd kick off Thanksgiving week by making some rice krispie turkey pops!  Check out the link to see the recipe.  I saw these on a post on Facebook, and I thought it would be something fun for Jakey and I to make.

So, we pulled up a chair....

And he waited patiently for the candy corn to get opened.... He LOVES candy corn!  In fact I had one bag left over from Halloween that I was going to use for the turkey pops, but two guys in our household...( by the names of Dada & Jakey) ate all of the candy corn this week.  Luckily, we were able to walk over to the store today and find some candy corn on clearance for $.49/bag.  Great deal, huh!

So, while Jake ate candy corn, he watched me do all of the work, but it was fun listening to him say, "Gobble,Gobble" every time we talked about the turkeys.

Overall, they were very easy to make.  Obviously, mine do not look as good as the ones shown on the link, but it was something fun for Jakey and I to do together.

Hope everybody has a Happy Thanksgiving!

Jake's Haircut | Julie Marie Portraits | Rochester, NY Photographer

Last night we ventured out to get Jake's haircut.  I got on the website, Kids Out and About, to look for children's haircut places and found Haircuts for Peanuts.  It looked really cute online, so I thought we'd give it a try!

On Jake's previous haircuts, either Josh or I would have to sit with him to get his haircut, but not this time!  He got up in the chair and didn't even try to get down once.  They had a flat screen tv on with cartoons, balloons, candy (Jake's favorite M&M's) and it was painted really fun with bright colors and murals on the walls.

Overall, a cute little place for kiddos to get haircuts!  And before I forget....if you haven't been on Kid's Out and About, you should check it out.  What a great site!  I have found it useful so many times especially being new to Rochester!

Can He Be 18 Months Already? | Julie Marie Portraits| Rochester, NY Photographer

Happy Holiday Weekend! | Julie Marie Portraits | Delaware Children's Photographer

Hope everybody has a happy & safe holiday weekend!  I had to share this little cutie with y'all!

And a few of my little man who turned 17 months on Thursday.  We celebrated by eating lots of popsicles, singing and dancing!