Honest to Blog

The month of May flew by. It started with a big weekend, I was baptized, and then it was Mother's Day, complete with a tornado warning. Next, we made a trip to see our family in Canton. Before we knew, it was Memorial Day weekend when Aunt Michele visited us with my cousin Jens. Needless to say, finding time to update my blog was a challenge.

It was a great a month and I have posted some pictures below to prove it.

Enjoy!
Ben

My Baptism – there are more pictures included my previous post

I have been eating solid foods for a while, but now that I have two teeth on the bottom I am becoming more and more excited to eat different foods. I love Puffs, but Mom and Dad refuse to let me eat them for every meal.

After a good meal, I like to swim in my new pool. Of course, I wait 30 minutes before doing so.

In Canton, one of the things I did was read the paper with Papa.

If you haven't noticed, I'm a good looking kid. Here I am checking myself out in my mirror – Hey everyone, come see how good I look!

Aunt Michele and Jens spent 4 days in Columbus with me. We had lots of fun. We went to the playground and the mall, and I even made my first trip to the campus of The Ohio State University to spend a Saturday afternoon.

My Mom's cousin Marie stopped by with her husband Andy for dinner one evening, and I got to play with her hair.

Here I am with Mom and Dad at Mirror Lake where they were engaged over eight years ago. Another couple got engaged while we were there in the same spot that my Dad proposed to my Mom.

Watching Jens run around was tiring so I took a nap in front of the Main Library.

Even with all of that excitement, I still found time to hang out with my Mom and Dad, and get in some good quality jumping.

My Big Day

On Sunday, May 4, I was baptized at my Church in Dublin, Ohio, Alleluia Lutheran. It was a very exciting day because my parents made a commitment to help me learn about Jesus and encourage me to grow in faith. In several years I will have the opportunity to confirm the promise my parents made on my behalf which will be another important day as I grow up.

I have included some pictures from the event. I had lots of friends and family join me for the day. Pastor Steve, who presided over the ceremony, married my parents in Canton. He gave a great message about the word baptism and that the word originally comes from the practice of pickling food to make it last longer, or to "save it." Very cool.

Rise up!

It is time for the NBA Playoffs and I have enjoyed watching the first week of action with my Mom and Dad. Nana and Papa were here for Game 1 of the Cavs/Wizards series which was fun but I fell asleep at the start of the 4th quarter.

LeBron James is amazing. In fact I'm considering changing my name to LeBen. Hopefully LeBron and the Cavaliers can keep winning and advance.

I like basketball a lot and have even started practicing. Check out my moves in the video below.

Let's go Cavs!

April: Now this is more like it

With March finally over, the fun has really picked up. I took my first trip to the park, watched the Buckeyes win the NIT championship, and hung out with Uncle Adam and Aunt Janelle during the Final 4 of the Men's NCAA Tournament. It has been a great month thus far. Below are some pictures from the first 12 days of April.

March? Really?

My parents had told me that March would be a great month because the weather would get warmer, the sun would shine more and the NCAA tournament would make watching basketball even better. After 20" of snow fell within the first week of the month and my college basketball bracket busted after the second day of the tournament (I should not have picked Portland State over Kansas), I'm not sure my parents know what they are talking about. Oh well, here are some pictures from the March Blizzard – thankfully, we all survived and the snow eventually melted.

Quick Story: My dad got stuck in New York during the snow storm trying to make his way back from Boston. He finally arrived at 5 PM on Saturday. He couldn't get up our driveway, so he got as far as he could and our friendly neighbors helped to dig-out his car later. Mom and I were very happy to see him.

The above picture was taken from inside my dad's plane after it landed in Columbus. As you can see the wheel was plowing through the snow during its 25 minute taxi to its arrival gate.