Brandon's first photo shoot

Gone are the baby mugshots that were taken when Jason & I were born....and when Ryan was born just 3 years ago!

Here are the shots taken at the hospital of our sweet baby...pretty cute, huh?

It's a Boy!

Boy, oh boy!....there's lots of trains, baseball, golf and "blue" in our future. We welcomed Brandon Nicholas on July 27 at 2:46 p.m. He weighed in at 7 lbs even and was 19 inches long. He has chubby cheeks and a cute nose, and lots of dark hair. He is a sweet baby...loves to snuggle and makes a cute *sigh* noise when he sneezes.

Here's Ryan -- bag packed and ready to go! He wasn't quite sure what was happening, but he did know that he was going to Grandma's, so that was O-K. He's wearing his "I'm going to be a Big Brother" shirt, which we later changed to "I'm a Big Brother." :)


B & E on July 27 (that's Bright & Early! at 6 a.m.) -- the last shot of preggo Mom. Brandon was not due until August 6, so I was a bit surprised when my water broke the morning of July 27. Fortunately Jason was home, so we packed our bags and headed to the hospital.


And later that afternoon - very first introductions.
Mom: "So this is the cutie patootie that's been poking me for the past 9 mo!"
Brandon: "So this is the crazy lady that's been talking to me for 9 mo!"
Thanks to the nurses for reminding Jason to take some pictures. He was scared that he'd get in trouble.

In the nursery just after Brandon's first bath. Jason was in the nursery with him. Ryan was outside the windows watching with Grandma.

Finally, Baby Brandon has been bathed, vitals checked and he's ours, all ours. Another first introduction -- Ryan climbed into bed to get a closer look at "our baby".....his little brother!


And while we're taking pictures, might as well get Dad in here too! The Murr Family....new and improved!

Other July festivities

Wow! July was a very busy month and the best was yet to come. After we celebrated Ryan's birthday, we kept busy with a few other activities.....

Jason took Ryan to a WWII plane show "Wings of Freedom" at the Aurora Airport (which is actually in Sugar Grove). Being the train geek that he is, Ryan wasn't really interested in the planes.

Splash! We made several trips to Splash Country, a small waterpark right down the street from our house. Ryan loved the huge sandbox, lazy river and zero depth area. And, at one of our later trips, he learned to jump in the pool. Swimming lessons are in order this winter!

Blackberry Farm was busy the last weekend in July....a vintage baseball game was played. The rules are a bit different from modern baseball -- for example, the fielders don't wear gloves, batters are actually called "strikers" and the striker is out if the ball is caught on a bounce. These games are fun - Jason & I saw one in Michigan at the Ford Museum several years ago.

The same day at Blackberry, there was a model train show. In this picture, Jason is helping Ryan pull the lever to race this train. Another little guy was across the track racing a 2nd train.

And in the same weekend, we went to the Sugar Grove Corn Boil. We went for lunch and munched on corn, corn dogs, funnel cake and lemonade shakeup. The sweet corn was great! Ryan had fun in this corn car that was in the Kids Zone. Thanks to all the volunteers who make this event possible, including our neighbor Jerry!

That's an interesting way of eating a corn dog....

Ryan is THREE!...party #3

And last, but certainly not least, we had a small gathering at our house for Great Grandma Murr and the grandparents. Dad made BBQ pulled pork on the grill, Ryan played outside with his water toys, and Ryan opened the last of many presents. Boy oh boy, what a birthday! Whew....

Knapford Station....oh boy!

Mom made a cake.

And Cranky the Crane! Now we can move some cargo.

Dad at the grill....soaked from playing with the new BuzzLightyear sprinkler.

Ryan wasn't quite sure about blowing out the candles, so Grandma helped.


Buzz Lightyear sprinkler from Jill, Ally, Kailey, Camryn and Adam. It's lots of fun!

Ryan is THREE!...party #2

Ryan loves trains and he loves riding the train at Blackberry Farm. What better place to have his birthday party! It was a warm summer day, but we had lots of shade in our picnic area. Everyone enjoyed lunch and then played at all the activities...train rides, pony rides, carousel rides, and more!

Abby, Ryan & Ayden are ready to eat these cookies!

It was Liam's first time at Blackberry Farm. Based on his smile that day, we think he had a good time!

Opening presents - the cousins all helped!

The Springborn cousins...Ryleigh, Ryan, Abby & Ayden

Dad and Mike were stylin!! (Nice of you to stand between them, Doug, but it doesn't really hide their cool outfits)

Ryan is THREE!....his actual birthday

On Ryan's actual birthday, the 3 of us ate at Texas Roadhouse. Ryan loves when they're celebrating a burthday and the entire restaurant yells YEE-HAW!...one night in April we were there and there were 4 birthdays. Ryan got lots of practice counting 1....2.....3...and then yelling yee-haw. This time it was his turn!

He sat on the saddle all by himself - the waitresses thought he was cute!


Enjoying one of the Roadhouse's famous rolls....that's all the kid eats when we go there!

Ryan is THREE! ...party #1

In our house, we joke that we celebrate birthdays for a month.....any excuse to prolong the time that we can eat treats or request more presents. We followed that pattern for Ryan's 3rd birthday!

My cousin Sarah and Ryan share the same birthday. This year Sarah was turning the big THREE-OH and Ryan was turning THREE, so Sarah and Aunt Leslie hosted a party at their house to celebrate.

A special Thomas cookie cake with a "3" on it!

Sarah helped Ryan blow out the candle. In the foreground, is the "other" cake....there was plenty!

Ryan and the other kids had fun playing in the octopus sprinkler!

There was a mean game of bags.....

Ryan's Amtrak Adventure!

The last weekend in June, we traveled by rail to Springfield for a weekend visit with Gram & Poppy. Dad planned our itinerary....

Thurs 5 p.m. Metra from Naperville to Chicago Union Station
7 p.m. Amtrak from Chicago to Springfield. Arrived in Springfield at 10:30 p.m.

Sunday 5 p.m. Amtrak from Springfield to Joliet, where Grandma & Grandpa limo service picked us up.

It took us a bit longer to travel to/from, but boy was it more fun (and interesting) than driving a car!

While we were in Springfield, we also had another neat experience. We picked up Uncle Chris from the St. Louis airport and chauffeured him to a wedding in Pike County. Along the way, we had to cross the Illinois River via the Kampsville Ferry. None of us had ever ridden a ferry before!

And, we got to tour the Hearland Lodge where Chris' friend Steve was hosting his wedding. It's a really neat place 'in the middle of no where'! http://www.heartlandlodge.com/

Railroad Museum in Union, IL

We made our first visit (I'm sure there will be more!) to the Illinois Railroad Museum in Union, IL. They have "barns" filled with trains and other live trains that you can ride.

If you like trains, you'll love this place! Rows and rows of all sorts of trains...engines, coaches, freight cars galore!

The engine looks like one of the animated trains on Chuggington (Disney's new train show).

Riding on one of the working trains...takes you on a ride about 20 min away from the museum.