Our Family, in chalk, drawn by Kaylyn, it's a great likeness of us!

Kaylyn has been showing Emmett how to draw on our patio stones. He seems interested at first, and draws some lines, but gets bored very quickly. So Kaylyn ends up making pictures for Emmett. She's good at it.

Here are some animals she drew.

mken

Read All About It... Boy get squashed by mom and... smiles?

Emmett enjoyed Kaylyn sitting on him, he thought it was funny. Actually he thinks anything silly we do is funny.

Enjoy the photo. I do... every-time I see it, I laugh.

mken

I love this shot of Emmett.

I took this photo last week. There's nothing more a boy hates then to be stuck inside on a rainy day. Although he seems to be at peace with it.

mken

Yes, now he can open up the refrigerator door.

Here he was caught in the act, eating grapes, one of his favorite fruits. He's been doing this for a while now. He doesn't seem to understand that he's wasting valuable energy keeping the door open - I guess that's just another thing to teach him.

He's really a chip of the old block. Daddy does it, why can't he?

mken

That is what it says on his new T-shirt from Cassandra.

That shirt... pretty much sums up Emmett. Not to say that he's trouble maker... it's that he's so curious about everything - that it seems he can find his way into troubled situations readily. I think that's normal for a toddler boy, right? Thought I would share this photo Kaylyn took of him and Lady yesterday evening. There's a lot of personality of him in this shot.

He truly is a joy to be with... really!

mken

Can you guess the secret ingredient?

Well, the result of blueberries and perches being ready in the same season is... Blueberry Peach Jam. YUMMY! Alright, I haven't tried it yet, but it sure was smelling good when Kaylyn was preparing it, plus the color of it looks amazing!

So has anyone figured out what the secret ingredient is yet? Well here's a couple of clues... it's colorless, odorless and tasteless. Nothing yet. OK, I'll give it to you, its... 'Air.' That's right, A. I. R., air. As you can see from the caned jars of jam, the jam is floating because it's very low in calories, we could make a fortune off of this recipe.

'So light, it floats' I think that might make a good tag line.

Nice job sweet heart!

mken

That's right, 40 pounds of blueberries!

Actually, we can't believe we picked that much either. I think Emmett ate at least 1/4 of a pound - mainly off the ground (nothing better then blueberries and sand, Yummy). We started off on the trip to 'Reenders Blueberry Farm' around 8:30 as Emmett clutched Bunny. Got there a little after 9:00, took a picture of Mom and Emmett and started to pick till about 10:30. Around 9:30 Emmett was hungry and started to snack on blueberries. He had quite a nice little set-up happening, a nice bucket stool, some water and a half of bucket of blueberries. What more could little boy want?

mken

Emmett's favorite toy... well... maybe just for today.

Kaylyn and Emmett went 'garage sale-ing' today. She found a play vacuum cleaner and some winter clothes for Emmett. When I came home from work today, he had his new fireman goulashes on the wrong feet - wanting to demonstrate how he vacuumed with the new vacuum cleaner. It was fun to see him with his boots on the wrong feet, vacuuming.

mken

No, we didn't go to the John G. Shedd Aquarium in Chicago. We were at our own house! Amazing!

There is a program on our Mac called 'Photo Booth' You sit in front of the Mac webcam, the program will then generate the aquarium effect in the background. Awesome right? Well maybe not that awesome - maybe... great. We sure had fun with it, look at our faces. Other effects that come with the program are Clouds, Earthrise, Eiffel Tower, Rollercoaster, Sunset and Yosemite.

Who needs a vacation when you can visit other places right on you computer. Right?

mken

We bought goulashes for Emmett this past Saturday.

He wasn't too sure of them at first, but after it rained on Sunday evening - I told him we could go outside and splash in the puddles... but we had to put his new boots on. I think this is what he heard...

'Rain, outside, spash, puddles.'

No toddler can say no to splashing in the water. Enjoy the picture.

mken

Emmett loves snack time, especially on daddy's chair.

A few weeks ago he started to climb up onto our dinning room chairs. This morning, he insisted that he had to eat on daddy's chair, rather then being buckled/tied into his own high chair (huh... I wonder why?). Here he is eating his grapes and cheese before going to church.

mken

Emmett seems to have a great fascination with the Mac we have.

Not only does he love to look at our desktop picture; two exotic clown fish that resemble 'Nemo' from the movie 'Finding Nemo'. He loves to climb up on the chair and play with the mouse and keyboard, he's probably imitating what mommy and daddy do. I think, he thinks, that it's just another one of his toys. His most favorite thing... looking at iPhoto to see all the pictures that we have taken on him.

Here's Emmett after his bath updating our social calender. Nice work buddy!

mken

This has to be the best investment we bought for Emmett since he was born. Kaylyn bought is from Target. He pushes that red stool around where-ever he needs to see what mom or dad are doing (like dishes) or needs to had some height for getting something off a shelf. We've got to watch out for our toes though, he's ran over them a couple of times already.

He does like helping us with the dishes... well most of the time... He mainly wants to play around in the soapy water and put the clean dried off dishes back into the dish water again. Hopefully he'll learn soon - He defiantly wants to be where the action is, as you can see from the photo with him in front of me doing dishes.

mken

On Friday, I decided to go with Kaylyn and Emmett to the Grand Rapids Children’s Museum. There exhibit was 'Aunt Daisy's Farm.' Children can pick apples, feed pretend animals, grow plants, gather eggs, and enjoy what it is like to live and work on a farm. Emmett had a great time, his most favorite activity was the sandbox, filled with tractors, dump trucks, bulldozers, shovels, sifters, etc, etc. I think he spent most of the time playing there. He also liked the Bubble Factory, Mirror Magic, Mom and Pop Store (equipped with a car) and the Big Kids Shredded Tire Play Area (this area had even bigger shovels, bigger dump trucks and bulldozers).

Here are the are some of the images we captured of him playing.

mken

Thought I would share this photo.

This shot was taken after Lady gave Emmett a bunch of kisses. I think Lady is finally excepting Emmett as part of the family. Besides the kisses, Emmett loves to hold on to Lady's leash and walk her about. As well, he loves to give her a good-night hug before he goes to bed, unfortunately Lady feels somewhat irritated from being disturbed from a nice snooze on the couch.

mken

I've been biking to work off and on for the past two weeks, it takes me about 7 min. to get to there, which I think is awesome! It's been nice not relying on a car for all my travel needs... and to think I'm going 'green' now, kinda, sort-off... whatever? There is about 4 or 5 other people at work who do the same, so I thought I would 'get on the bandwagon*'. Thanks to my lovely wife for buying such a nice bike and letting me use it.

Emmett loves to see, touch and wear the equipment that belongs to the bike. Here he is ready to ride in the future 'Tour De France 2030.'

mken

*Get on the bandwagon - to become involved in an activity which is successful so that you can get the advantages of it yourself.
Origin: 1881. The moment when the circus bandwagon, first mentioned in 1855, became a figurative expression for a burgeoning political movement.

Reading.

This seems to be one of Emmett's favorite things to to with mom and dad. More so, he likes to read to the same book, 3 to 5 times. His most favorite, 'Maisy's Fire Engine.' He loves to hear us say 'nee-nah, nee-nah!' (fire engine sound). As well as, 'Swoosh', 'Watch out' and finally 'bye-bye.'

As you can see by the photo, he's making good effort to read himself.

mken


If your child likes hearing sound effects, this book is a good read for the little one.
Maisy's Fire Engine (Hardcover), Lucy Cousins (Author)

It's a bird, no, no... it's a plane, no that's not it... its, its, Crazy Sunglasses Dude.

But really... he's pointing at a plane flying overhead. Kaylyn and I had not noticed how many times planes flew over until Emmett started to notice a few weeks back. Leave it to him - he'll tell you. He's had these sunglasses forever, now one lens has popped out. Doesn't seem to phase him though. As you can see from the images below.

He certainly has the expressions of a rock star down, sweet and coy, stone faced and serious and finally just a hanging out cool expression.

mken

We are finally seeing the 'fruits of our labor' or would it be the 'vegetables of our labor?'

The top image is climbing beans traveling up bamboo poles, I can't wait to see the beans. The two middle images is our cucumber plant with cucumber and tomato plants with a small tomato - I think we are going to need some warm and sunny days for them to really take off. The bottom image is our little herb garden in pots. I think we have Rosemary, Basil, Parsley, and Oregano.

I know it's not that impressive - but it's fun to see grow.

< click on image to enlarge

mken

Well, here it is...

It only took me about a month to complete. The process was lengthy.

1. First I had to grade about 15x15 feet for the swing to sit on something level or semi-level (I think I moved about 5 tons of dirt and clay, or at least that's the way I felt).

2. Even though the playset came in a box I still had to pre-drill and assemble it.

3. Once the shell was put together, Kaylyn and I did a 'dry fit' and found that the slide didn't work going down the hill.

4. We added landing with a stair for Emmett which fixed the slide problem.

5. I then made a sandbox under the climbing wall/slide section of the playset (this was not in the playset plans, but made by my powerful brain).

6. We then ended up buying some mulch from flower land (2 yards) Way much more then we need. At least it wasn't 15 yards, right mom & dad DeDoes?
ha ha.

7. Now Emmett and us are enjoying our finished project. Now we need to do is get some pictures of Emmett playing on the playset.

mken

Hey!

Like I said in my other blog post a day ago; Thankfully Emmett likes his baths.

He continues to love getting naked, turning on the water and getting into his big and yellow rubber duck to play with is water toys. He does hate one thing - his hair being washed, more specifically getting water over his head to get the soap out of his hair.

But as you can see from the picture - he loves the dry off in his towel.

mken

Whaaaaaat you might ask?

I had a couple of people ask me about what 'mken' was, some thought I misspelled my name. There... like... ummmmmm... Mike you missed the 'i' in your name. I know I'm not the best speller, but I did create it that way. It's an abbreviation for, Mike, Kaylyn, Emmett, Nykamp.

So there you go... (famous words from Gus Portokalos;
'My Big Greek Fat Wedding'

mken

It has been a while since I last wrote on this blog. It's been a busy winter and spring for me a Vox, thus the sporadic entries.

A lot has happened since my last entry, here's a short list,
• Emmett loved searching for eggs out side on Easter.
• If Emmett had it his way he would live outside.
• Emmett Loves to help us with the dishes.
• Emmett wants to climb everything that is taller then him.
• I (Miken) became an American citizen.
• Emmett gets sick of his toys after about 5 minutes.
• Grandpa and Grandma DeDoes visited us from Washington State.
• Emmett loves helping mom with baking.
• Emmett likes to rip open gifts that are not his.
• Emmett has a rock collection.
• Grandpa and Grandma Nykamp visited us from Canada.
• Emmett loves rain puddles.
• Emmett absolutely loves anything motorized.
• Emmett likes hugging and petting Lady.
• Emmett likes his pool on hot days.
• Emmett got baptized.
• Emmett loves to help dad with projects around the house.
• Emmett loves to show off what he is wearing every morning.
• Emmett loves to read what we are reading.
• Emmett likes to swing and slide on his new playset.
• Thankfully, Emmett still loves his baths.

I'll try my best to have regular blog entries in the future.

Hope you all are doing well, all the best!

mken

Hello All,

Just a short note. I know it's been a while since I've wrote on my blog, but it has been busy at work - which doesn't leave me with a lot of time to update it every week. So, I'll try to be better at it. Nothing much going on around here, just love seeing Emmett growing up.

Here are some of his favorite things to do now.

1. Pull us by or finger around the house.
2. Hugging his green bunny.
3. Pretend he's cooking something with his pots and pans.
4. Eating with his fingers and getting a lot of food over his face.
5. Loves giving us books to read to him and sitting in our laps.
6. Loves paging through books on our bed.
7. Hated sitting still for his year old picture.
8. Likes to watch us do dishes.
9. Still loves to get in places he's not suppose to be.
10. Loves sledding with his mom and dad.


The next top chef.


Hugging Mr. Bunny.


Jam on the face.


Bruce Springsteen look alike.


He loves his applesauce.


Outside with daddy.


Outside with mommy.


Paging through a book on our bed.


One of the many shots Kaylyn took of Emmett for his year old photo. I think this picture explains his feelings of the whole photo-shot.