Thursday, December 11, 2008

Updates

What's been going on with us? Well, Avery is trying his hardest to crawl. He's developed his own version of an Army low crawl that he'll do to reach something close. This morning he "crawled" all the way from the TV to the rocking chair which is several feet. He still rolls a lot though, especially to reach things that he deems too far away. Also, he's working on getting his top two teeth. Maybe he'll get them for Christmas! :-)

Alexis doesn't have too much new going on. She did talk us into going to Chuck E Cheese's for supper last night. The kids' school had a fundraiser going on, if you went last night then 15% of your purchase went back to the school. We decided it was worth it and braved the crowd in order to help out our kids' education. While we were there, she pointed out her best friend's "enemy." She actually said "that's Hunter's enemy." I asked his name and she said "I don't know but we don't like him." What could a kindergartner possibly do to be deemed an "enemy?"

Austin has recently lost his 10 year old teeth. I didn't realize that you loose teeth at 10 but the dentist says you do. He now has 4 teeth missing on the bottom. Its made it hard for him to eat and talk. He's harder to understand than normal. I feel bad because I'm constantly asking him to repeat himself. Hopefully they come in soon. Austin has joined the Philosophers Club at school. He's so funny! He can't ever remember the name so he's decided to give the club a nickname, The World According To The Jockischs Club. HAHAHA! He's also a part of the band and GT math so he keeps pretty busy at school. And, apparently he has a girlfriend again. He won't confess to us though so we aren't for sure.

That's all for now. I'll try to add a video within a few days.

Thursday, October 23, 2008

Laughing at Big Brother

This is from a few weeks ago but I wanted to share it anyway.
Avery is laughing at Austin's foot. Yes, his foot.
Austin was pretending to kick Avery and he thought it was funny.
Unfortunately I didn't get the camera fast enough and missed him
when he was laughing really hard. This was the tail end when was
winding down. Its still cute though!

This past week

The happenings of this week....

Alexis had her 6th birthday on Sat. October 18th. We had a birthday party and invited all her friends. We did a Strawberry Shortcake theme and had all the kids come dressed up as their fave dress up clothes. We had a baseball player, 2 Transformers, several princesses and more. The party went well. We played lots of games and had cake and ice cream. Alexis got lots of presents and had a great time.

Austin decided he didn't want to be a part of the party. Too many little kids for such a grown up 5th grader to handle. :-) He stayed in the basement for a while and finally ended up leaving the house altogether. He spent most of the day down the street at his friend, Dakota's. Which was fine because Dakota's Mom, brother and sister where at our house for the party.

Austin has joined the school band. He's playing the trumpet. They learned their first song this week called "Go Groveton." He hasn't played it for us yet but I'm sure we will be graced with it soon.

Avery has been starting the crawling process. He's been pushing himself backwards with his hands and can turn in circles when he's on his belly. He hasn't gotten up on his knees yet but I'm sure its coming soon. His 2 bottom teeth are almost completely in and I think he's starting on some more. He's also learned he can bite pretty good. We now know not to put our fingers in his mouth. Those little teeth hurt!

I may possibly have a baby sitting job. Our friends that live around the corner had a baby sitter who upset them so she won't be coming back. Patrick volunteered my services. Its 2 nights a week for about 4 hours. Nothing I couldn't handle and we could use the extra money. Man, diapers are expensive!

Patrick will be gone for the next 2 days. He's staying overnight at Walter Reed for some tests. They're going to monitor his sleep and do several brain scans. They think he may have something called TBI which stands for Traumatic Brain Injury. They've found a lot of soldiers coming back from Iraq have it. They generally get it when a roadside bomb goes off near their vehicle, the vehicle shakes and rocks back and forth which throws them around and they hit their head. In most cases its not severe, so much so that its sometimes hard to detect without doing some kind of x-ray/scan. If Patrick does have it, its obviously not a severe case. Some soldiers with severe TBI have a complete change in personality, loss of some physical movement and their ablility to think is altered. The mild form can cause mood swings, memory problems, frustration issues, headaches and attention deficits. Patrick has most of the mild symptoms so it wouldn't surprise me if the tests show he has TBI. A lot of those symptoms go along with PTSD also though so you never know if its the PTSD of if he really has TBI. If he does have it, its not something to freak out about. If he has it then he's obviously had it for the past 5 years. Nothing would change, we would just now be aware of it and possibly some of his treatment methods would change. We'll let you all know what he finds out.

Monday, October 6, 2008

Just a little squealing and talking


No, he's not fussy.
These are the sounds he makes when he's playing.

Isn't that sweet

I have a good Alexis story from this weekend: Austin asked a question about the Bible. I don't remember what it was exactly but we started talking about different stories and things that are in the Bible. Alexis, out of nowhere, says "I think God's making a story about Grandpa Eldon." Apparently Dad's getting a spot in the Bible. :-) I thought it was pretty cute!

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Giggly Boy

Avery is laughing again.  This time he's laughing at a piece of paper that Austin is throwing around the kitchen.  Oh, the things that amuse babies!

Sunday, September 28, 2008

News from the past week!

This is what happen this past week:

Avery went for his 6 month doctor's visit.  He weighs 19 lbs. 13 oz and was 26-27 inches long.  He growing and developing well according to the doctor.  He, unfortunately, had to get 3 shots.  He didn't hold a grudge against the nurse though.  As soon as the shots were over, I picked him up and he stopped crying and immediately gave the nurse a big smile.
 
We found this weekend that Avery has his first tooth coming through.  You can't see it yet but you sure can feel it when he bites!

Alexis has set her first play date of the school year.  This Friday she's going to her best friend, Hunter's, house after school.  She's so excited!

Austin got to have his friends, George and David, spend the weekend with us.  Their parents went out of town so they stayed at our house.  What a difference two extra boys can make!  Right after the boys left, Austin got into trouble.  It was defiantly the last straw...he's now grounded for the week.  

Also adding to Austin bad week, he broke up with his girlfriend Melissa.  He says she's crazy.  He better just learn now that all girls are crazy.  Learn to live with it!  HEHEHE!

Patrick went to the Pentagon again this week.  He joked about it all week, in his best Forrest Gump voice.  He received a coin and an AAM (Army Achievement Medal)  for recovering the colors (That means doing the ceremony of saluting the US flag and folding it and returning it to its case. ) and also all the state flags and the Unit's flag after the Army Intelligence Ball then returned them to the Unit's building.  Not a big deal but apparently a 3 Star General was there and was impressed that the soldier's were taking time out of their weekend to help clean up.  Not that they had a choice, mind you.  They weren't exactly asked, more like told but they got awards for it anyway.
 
Anyway, that's what happened here this past week.  Miss you all!


At Stoneybrook Park


Alexis thought she needed to use the baby swings with Avery.  She a little too big and he's a little too small.  Go figure!

Saturday, September 20, 2008

Alexis quotes

Alexis quotes of the week:

After telling us all she knows about the sun and stars she says "Yeah, I'm a genius!"  No self esteem problem there.

Talking to Austin at the dinner table "What do you want to be when you grow up?  A soldier like Daddy or a regular guy like Grandpa Terry."  Sorry Grandpa Terry!


Also, this week:

Austin has a girlfriend, Melissa.  They were in the same class last year and are again this year.  They sit next to each other.  Might have to talk to his teacher.  :-)

Avery has really started rolling around.  He can navigate the living room and get to things he sees across the room.  This morning he kept trying to get to Alexis who was rocking in the recliner.  I had to keep moving him back across the room so he wouldn't get hurt rolling under the chair but he kept rolling back over to her.  Now the fun begins!

Austin is currently at the Navy football game in Annapolis.  He went with the neighbor boys, their Dad is retired Navy.  They go every year to at least one game and were nice enough to invite Austin along this time.  All I can say is "No sibling fighting today.  Woohoo!"

That's all that's new with us.  I'll add more if something new and exciting happens.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Eating and Talking


Avery first time eating peas.  He makes a face at first but decides he'll keep eating it.  Then he decides to take a break so he can chat.  He starts talking about a minute into the video.

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Natural History Museum



I thought this section of the museum was kind of weird. Its dead, stuffed animals behind a glass wall. Bizarre!

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

Laughing at Austin

Come on School

We are really ready for school to start. The kids are getting restless and definitely need some time without each other. Too much togetherness this summer! We just have to get through this weekend.

Alexis had her school physical today and she did really well. She ranked in the 80% range for her height and 90% for her weight. I wouldn't have guessed her to be that big for her age. She only need one shot so she was very happy about that. At first, the doctor told her she would need 4 so 1 was a huge improvement.

Austin got new glasses today. Well, we ordered them so he doesn't actually have them yet but they should be here next week. Daddy helped pick them out, I have no idea what they look, so I hope they look ok on him. We'll post pictures when he gets them.

Avery had peas for the first time today. It was hysterical! He made the best faces. Apparently he's not too fond of peas. Most of it ended up on his bid, don't think too much went into the tummy. We have some pictures posted on our shutterfly site. The link is posted above.

Well, that's all for now. I'll post more later.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

Big Week

Such a big week. First, Alexis feel and hit her head so we took her to the hospital for a CT Scan. Everything came back normal which was good. She ended getting the flu later that day. Bummer! Avery rolled over for the first time and discovered his toes that same night. The next day Alexis was better but Austin had the flu. The day after that Alexis lost her first tooth so now she has a black eye and a missing tooth. Add to all that, Erin, Randy, Cody and Laura are all here and we're doing a lot of sight-seeing. Busy week!

Thursday, July 31, 2008

Avery screaming

Made it Home

We made it back to Virginia. We're happy to be back in our own house again. We've been doing a little site-seeing with Cody and Laura. Yesterday we went to the American Indian Museum. You can check out pictures of it on our shutterfly account. The link is posted above. 'tomorrow we're going to the Spy Museum. We can't wait. Its supposed to be a really good museum.

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

We're Here!

For those of you that don't know, we made it to IL last week. We're happy to finally have made it. What a long car ride with a baby! He was pretty good though. Hope to see you all while we're here.

Thursday, July 3, 2008

Coming soon

I don't have much time so I'll keep it brief. Patrick was told today that he either has to come to work on Tuesday and start his leave on Wednesday or he has to start his leave today. We originally were going to leave Tuesday so it throws a kink in the plans. We're trying to work out a few appointments we have scheduled over the next few days and if all goes well, we'll be leaving Sat. Maybe we'll see you sooner than planned. Got packing to do and calls to make. No matter the outcome, we'll see you soon.

-Katie

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Coming to IL

We are currently getting ready to take a trip to Illinois. We're leaving July 8th to go see our families. We're really excited for everyone to meet our new addition, Avery. He's really growing and is now out of the newborn stage. He's started smiling, laughing and "talking" a lot. I'll add a video of him laughing at Mommy that we took last night. Such a happy baby! Can't wait for all of you to meet him!

Laughing at Mommy